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sunlightmurdock · 1 year

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The Parent Trap | Prologue | Bradley Bradshaw x Ex-Wife!Reader

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♡ In which, after a couple of years of listening to Peyton and Parker Bradshaw complain about their parents’ custody agreement, Grandpa Mav’s meddling goes a little bit too far.

♡ warnings: mentions of divorce throughout the fic, flashbacks to arguments and unhappily married people. Idiots who still love each other and don’t know it. (warnings will be added as story progresses).

…

“God dammit.” You sigh, leaning down into the passenger side footwell to grab your phone. After your hasty parking job, it’s wedged pretty securely under the metal bottom of the seat, impossible to reach from the angle you’re sitting in. You move up onto your knees and lean over, rummaging around for the lost device. This is the last thing you need.

It’s the third week of the semester and the second time so far that you’ve been called into the principal’s office.

The faint sound of seventies music coming from somewhere behind your shoulder alerts you to your ex-husband’s presence before you can see him. Shit, it must be bad if Rooster left work for it.

He turns his engine off and glances to his left. His lips quirk softly at the sight before him. You, in a pair of tight denim shorts, bent over the centre console and leaning down into the passenger side, searching for something. His smirk only grows as he steps down from his truck and swings the door shut behind him, tapping on the window of your 2018 Toyota corolla.

You flinch at the sound and turn your head to look back at him over your shoulder. He smiles, lifting his hand and waving his fingers at you. No matter how long passes between you seeing him, he always looks the same — and he’s usually got that smug look on his face. You roll your eyes and turn back towards your mission.

It’s been two years since the divorce became official. Still, Bradley glances down at those form fitting shorts and reminisces. It’s an outfit like that that got you into this mess in the first place. Fingers curling around your phone, you huff and catch ahold of your bag, then sit upright again. Rooster grabs the door and pulls it open, stepping out of your way.

“How’s it going, Mama?”

You scoff, shaking your head as you drape the tote over your shoulder and slip your phone into your back pocket. “I’d be better if your kids stopped being such miscreants.”

He chuckles, flightsuit tied around his waist and gold rimmed sunglasses covering his eyes. The teachers around here always go wild when he shows up like this. “My kids, huh?”

You step around him and nod your head, wishing that you were less familiar with the path to the principal’s office than you currently are. Rooster trails behind you, taking another quick glance down at those shorts he’s so fond of, “Did they tell you what we’re here for?”

“No, the lady on the phone just said that Principal James needed to speak to the both of us.” Rooster confirms your suspicions. This must be pretty bad. You groan in frustration, pushing through the front door.

“That’s what they told me too — I wonder what they did now.” You can only shake your head at the thought as the two of you sign in and are led to the principal’s office. Rooster takes his time, looking around at the colourful artwork on the walls, seemingly unfazed by whatever havoc your children have caused this time. He’s always so calm when it comes to them. He had been so different in the beginning. Terrified when those two blue lines showed up. Nauseous when the doctor confirmed that there were two heartbeats. He had almost blacked out during your labour. You can still remember the way he had periodically baby proofed not only the place that you shared, but also his Uncle Maverick’s house and your parents’ place. Anywhere his kids were going needed to be up to his standard.

Somewhere after the year mark, they had become significantly less fragile in his eyes. When they’re jumping off of high surfaces or climbing trees, dangling off of the slide at the park, he’s usually nearby with a smile on his face. He likes seeing his kids be more carefree than he ever was in childhood.

Rounding the corner, the girls’ reactions to the two of you are exceptionally polarized. When you had been told that you were expecting identical twin girls, you had expected the polar opposite trope — a mischievous daredevil tomboy and a goodie-two shoes who loved to dress up. Instead, you had received two partners in crime who were somehow all of those things at once. Freckled skin, rounded, rosy cheeks and long curls, it’s hard to tell them apart sometimes, but they still have their differences.

Peyton, Twin A — as determined by your first ultrasound, your firstborn, sits upright and beams at the two of you. It’s a rare occasion that she sees both of her parents in the same place these days. “Daddy!”

At her side, Parker, Twin B, your youngest, shrinks down in her chair in immediate realization. If you’re both here, then they’re in big trouble. For a seven year old, she’s getting good at reading the room. She turns those big brown eyes towards the ground and purses her lips.

Peyton leaps up and rushes forwards, wrapping her arms around Rooster’s waist, pressing her freckled cheek into her stomach. He grunts softly as she hits into him, then breaks out grinning as he hugs her against his middle, “Hey, Honeybee.”

He looks towards his remaining daughter. Parker glances up sheepishly, hands folded into her lap. Bradley smiles softly, “How about you, Peanut? — You got a hug for Daddy?”

You fold your arms over your chest as he pushes herself up from the chair. Bradley settles down onto his knees, opening up his arms and taking one of them in each. He hums as he hugs them tightly against him, then pulls back and scrunches his nose just slightly. “So, what’d you guys do?”

The twins stop and then share and equally worrisome glance. You squint at the two of them. “Girls.” You prompt.

“It was an accident!”

“Yeah, we didn’t mean to!”

Rooster lifts his head and this time it’s your turn to share equally worried looks. The door clicks open ahead of you.

Principal James steps out and rests her wrinkled hands on her hips. Rooster stands upright at your side. Under that cold, weathered gaze, it suddenly feels like the two of you are the ones in trouble. You swallow softly as she lifts a hand and beckons you into her office without a word.

“Sit down, girls, we’ll be right back.” You say softly, tapping their shoulders and nudging them back towards their seats. Rooster tucks his sunglasses into the collar of his black t-shirt and closes the oak office door behind him. You sit down in one of the chairs opposite her impressive, heavy mahogany desk.

She has been teaching for twenty years, and your twins have still managed to surprise her on this occasion.

“Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw, I wish I could say that it’s a pleasure to be speaking with you today,” Her tone is sharp. Rooster presses his tongue to the inside of his cheek, whilst you count the tiles on the ceiling. “Unfortunately, today’s meeting has a rather unpleasant subject matter. Are you at all aware of the twins’ mission to… impersonate each other?”

Rooster’s lips quirk. They’ve been trying to swap places since they were two. They usually get caught pretty quickly. They’ve done it at school before, but they always mess up quickly. Their longest record for being undetected was three days at your parents’ house. “Yeah, they do that as a joke sometimes.”

“Well, today they switched outfits in the bathroom and went into each other’s classes.”

Your brows scrunch slightly. Sure, it’s a dumb thing to do, but it can’t be a punishable offense to swap outfits with your sister. Principal James looks between the two of you and finds no remorse on either of your faces so far. Clearly you aren’t following.

“Has Parker ever mentioned a boy named William Prescott?”

“Oh my god.” You sigh, pinching the bridge of your nose. Bradley frowns at your side, looking between you and the principal, lost. You turn your head. “He’s been picking on her. He pushed her down in the playground last week.”

“That’s what that cut on her knee was? — She said she tripped.” Bradley frowns, immediately engaging in that protective parent mode that’s neither helpful or impressive.

“She didn’t want to tell you because she knew you’d freak out.” You explain sitting back in the chair and rubbing at your temples. Her judgemental stare is just about enough to bring you out in a stress rash.

“So, why didn’t you tell me?” Bradley’s tone is accusatory, his expression even more so. He’s always been protective when it comes to his girls, including you not too long ago. It’s a sweet sentiment, but sometimes it’s too much and the girls are quickly picking up on that.

“Because I knew you’d freak out, and I already spoke to Billy’s mom about it.” You speak gently, acutely aware of the way that the principal’s crows feet deepen when she squints dubiously at you like she’s doing now. Rooster remains completely unaware of her judging your parenting at your side.

“Clearly that worked because —“

“The twins switched classrooms so that Peyton could, in their words, ‘take care of’ the issue.” Principal James interrupts. Both you and your ex-husband are silenced as you stare ahead at her. “Peyton proceeded to walk over to William’s desk and hit him in the face.”

You press a hand over your mouth and close your eyes, exhaling softly. Bradley sits back in the chair, leaning his head back and groaning quietly.

“At this moment in time, we have no choice but to place the twins on a short suspension.”

You purse your lips and wince. Seven years old and suspended for plotting out, and executing assault. This isn’t your proudest parenting moment.

“Suspension? — They’re in the second grade, it was just—“

“We won’t be reconsidering our decision, Mr. Bradshaw,” The principal interrupts, holding out a hand to silence him. He glances across at you. “There is some paperwork for you at the front desk, we look forward to having the girls back in a week’s time. Maybe the two of you could have a word with them about their behavior during their time off.”

Scolded, the two of you step out into the hallway, each of you silently blaming the other. The twins look at the two of you expectantly.

“Give us a second to talk, okay? — Don’t move, you’re both in big trouble.” Rooster warns them, his face stern. They frown at him in unison, then look towards each other. He reaches out, tapping his fingers against your forearm to nudge you away from the two of them. Once you’re out of earshot, he folds his arms over his chest.

“Alright, we should probably talk to them about this together, so I can swing by your place tonight after work. Like six?” He checks his watch and looks back up at you.

“Wait, wait — I can’t take them right now, I have meetings with clients all afternoon. Today’s your day to pick them up.” You frown at him. The custody agreement was fifty-fifty, two days with you, two days with him. It’s inconvenient for both of your schedules and the twins hate moving around as much as they do, but neither one of you has had the time recently to call up the lawyers and fix a new schedule.

“No, I have a debrief today that I’m already going to be late for. It’s your day.” Bradley shakes his head quickly and crosses his arms over his chest. Sometimes you think that he just does that to show off his arms. His biceps strain against the fabric of that fitted black shirt.

He’s bigger now than when you met him, filled out more into his adulthood. Years of lifting two growing girls up whenever they ask him to. Heading to the gym often so that they won’t outgrow being held by him.

Still, there’s a reason that it’s over and tanned skin and arm veins won’t change that.

“No, it’s Tuesday. The seventh.” You argue.

“Actually, it’s Wednesday. The seventh.” He mocks you back. Real mature. But, unfortunately— your phone confirms that he’s correct. You sigh and throw your head back. You’ve been so out of sorts all week, turned around with work and the kids.

Two kids running wild around a boutique that’s smaller than some of your clients’ closets. You can just see it now, them breaking into the expensive fabric whilst you’re distracted with clients. You shake your head quickly. “Shit. I can’t take them to work with me.”

Bradley purses his lips. Two kids on a naval base while he’s in a confidential meeting that they can’t sit in on sounds like an even worse idea.

When you found out you were expecting, the two of you had made an agreement that your career wouldn’t suffer as a result of parenthood. Given that Rooster is practically government owned, it’s hard for him to be as flexible as he would like. But, he has always made sure you had the support you needed. “Hold on, I’ll call Mav.”

It seems like a bad idea to send the twins to practically their favourite place on earth when they’re supposed to be being punished, but you’re out of other options.

“Idiot, I told you to wait until recess to—“ Parker’s voice trails as she spots her parents headed back in her direction. Peyton squints at the frown on her father’s face. The two of them learned early on that their Dad was wrapped around their fingers, he could barely stand to punish them and so he let them get away with more. The look on his face now tells them that he’s serious.

“I was doing you a favour.” Peyton whispers back angrily.

One look at their guilty little faces and they’re already tugging at your heartstrings. Still, you need to be strong.

“Your father and I have to get back to work, but we want you to know that we are taking this very seriously — we’re going to have a long talk about this later tonight, okay? — What you did was so wrong!”

Rooster glances across at you. Watching the same girl that he was doing body shots off of ten years ago turn out to be such a good mother is an interesting turn of events. He bites his cheek to contain his smile. If you told him back then that things would have turned out like this, with two incredible children, he wouldn’t have believed a word of it.

“We’re sorry.” They say at the same time, looking up at the two of you with those brown doe-eyes. It’s the winning combo, they inherited that puppy-dog look from their dad and mastered it years ago, and they are expressly aware of how funny Rooster finds it when they say the same thing at the same time.

As Rooster stands firm, both of you unwavering before them, your twins give in to their fate and sit back, groaning in complaint.

After his retirement last year, which he was practically forced into, kicking and screaming, Maverick was practically itching to babysit the girls every chance he gets. With Amelia off at college now, and Penny banning him from around the house DIY, he likes the chaos that they bring. For similar reasons, they adore Maverick.

“I’m serious, Mav,” Rooster frowns, his face stern as he holds the twins still. They’re practically buzzing with excitement at his sides as they wait to be allowed inside. “They’re in big trouble. No TV, no games. Have them sit there and finish the worksheets their teacher gave them, or have them clean the floors or something, I don’t care. No fun.”

Maverick takes a quick glance downwards at his freckle-faced granddaughters, both of them staring up at him in worry, hoping that he’ll disagree with their dad.

“Sure thing. I’ll keep ‘em busy.” Maverick agrees seriously, giving a quick, orderly nod of his head. The girls both frown, dejected as they pout at the wooden slats of the porch.

“Alright. If their Mom gets here before I do,” Bradley lowers his voice and squints at his uncle. “Do me a favour and please don’t be weird.”

“Weird? — I’m never weird.” Maverick answers defensively. Bradley squints at him. That’s far from true and they both know it. Maverick was always a big fan of you — you remind him of himself in some ways, and he’s always thought you were good for Bradley. Rooster still jokes that Maverick was more upset about the divorce than anyone else.

“Uh… alright. Be good for Mav, I’ll see you guys later. I love you.”

Maverick ushers the girls inside at once and waits until Bradley’s truck disappears down the road before he turns to address them. With it pouring rain outside, and the trouble they’re in, there’s limited fun that they can have. Something with no evidence. Before that, he needs a chore that they can complete that will satisfy Rooster but not take all afternoon and kill Mav’s fun.

“Alright, we’re clearing out the hallway closet, kids. Move it.”

An hour later, Maverick’s brows are furrowed as he’s thirty pieces into a two hundred piece puddle, sitting in the middle of the hallway floor. His navy expertise means that the twins have a good system, Peyton pulling down items, Parker sorting them into keep or toss.

Only, given the difficulty of piecing together the dozen shades of blue that make up the sailboat puzzle, Maverick hasn’t noticed that they stopped sorting through items five minutes ago. Now, they’re both leaning over a photo album, flicking through pictures.

“Is this Mommy?”

Maverick looks up, brows furrowed. He spins the album towards him without question and smiles at the picture. This was when he was teaching Top Gun that one time, it’s a picture of you at the beach, holding a football and posing with your arm flexed into a muscle.

“Yeah, look at this one.” Maverick flicks to the next page and spins it back towards the two of them. Their faces twist up in a mixture of excitement and amusement. It’s a picture of Rooster draped around you, squeezing you in his arms, his head resting against yours, the two of you beaming. Behind the two of you, the twins’ Uncle Jake is flexing both of his biceps, sticking his tongue out to bomb the picture.

“Daddy’s tummy doesn’t look like that anymore.” Parker snorts, shaking her head, cheeks dimpling as she looks up with a grin on her face. Maverick smiles. He sees so much of the both of you in the both of them.

“They look really really happy.” Peyton adds on.

Maverick nods. “They were. Here, you want to see some more?”

Chores quickly abandoned, daytime movie channel playing on the TV, cutting out every now and again as the weather screws with the signal, the living room floor is littered with old albums.

“Mommy’s wedding dress was so pretty.” Peyton traces her fingertips over the picture, examining the intricacies of the dress. Maverick smooth his hands over her curls and nods his head.

“That day was so special. Your Daddy was so nervous all day.” He chuckles fondly at the memory. Standing at the end of the aisle with Rooster and periodically reminding him to breathe. After so much missed time with Bradley, all of those years of not speaking, sitting here and listening to these delighted little giggles makes his heart warm.

He hadn’t ever been ready for children, but it turns out that being a grandfather was his calling. Passing on his stories, explaining funny faces and little anecdotes about each picture that they come across, seeing their little faces just light up.

They work through the wedding pictures, the work events, the beach days. The pregnancy, the birth, the newborn pictures.

“Is that me or her?” Parker asks as she squints at a picture of you holding a chubby-cheeked newborn on Mav’s porch, smiling tiredly. Maverick remembers that first year of parenthood, you and Bradley stumbling around half-awake that entire time.

“Honey, I’m not even sure who’s who right now.” Maverick admits with a smile. They roll their eyes fondly and continue to flip through memories they’re too small to remember.

They move onto pictures of their toddler years. Lots of pigtails and matching dresses back then, muddy knees and toothy grins. Peyton lingers on one page, lips falling down into a soft frown as she slips the picture from its place on the page.

It’s a picture of them in the backyard at their house, sitting in the sandpit that Rooster had built one summer after reading that it’s good for safety and motor skills all at once. Him, sitting in a pair of shorts and those gold rimmed sunglasses, shoulder reddened under the sun, dog tags hanging around his neck, grinning. Peyton, on his lap, eyes squeezed shut as she squeals excitedly, sand balled in her chubby fists. You, at his side, wearing a pretty sundress and grinning against his cheek, right about to kiss him once you can stop laughing. Parker standing between your legs, lips parted, staring towards the camera like she just heard something shocking.

Mav, behind the camera, his heart so full.

“I wish they were still together.” Peyton mumbles dejectedly. Her sister looks over and examines the picture, then gives a small nod. They hate being without one of you all of the time.

Maverick looks up and looks between the two of them. Those pouted lips, that sad look in those eyes. He looks back down at the happy couple in that picture. The two of you were so in love back then.

It should take him longer to think about than it does. He probably shouldn’t include them in the decision making, but it’s not the worst idea he has had in the past couple of years.

“Have you guys ever seen the Parent Trap?”

…

@thedroneranger @xoxabs88xox @khaylin27 @unordinare @shanimallina87 @sufferingophelia

#bradley rooster bradshaw #bradley bradshaw #miles teller #bradley bradshaw smut #rooster x you #rooster bradshaw imagine #top gun smut #bradley bradshaw au #bradley bradsaw x reader #bradley bradshaw x reader

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qqueenofhades · 2 months

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Hi just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to thoughtfully respond to these anon messages. I work in dc w a fairly wonky set and i cant overstate how haunted the DC Professional Thought Havers are by the spectre of the "low propensity voter." I think these ppl (myself included LOL) thought we had everything figured out ahead of the 2016 elections and then never recovered from the way it ended up going......i feel like in all the years that followed.....the liberal bubbles.....the coastal elites.......the hillbilly elegies......the real america....the ohio diners....the pennsylvania diners.......the polls......the 2020 horserace....while part of an earnest attempt to understand What Happened, were primarily self-indulgent, self-flagellation for being "out of touch" bc of a self-diagnosed "elite" status that then turned into ANOTHER myopic view of the world, just opposite, where the "libs" are hapless and everyone else remotely to the left are primarily victims to the unstoppable supernatural forces of the Right. Then in 2020 the narrative flipped AGAIN and once again, instead of taking the opportunity to expand a worldview and having the bravery to confront their own shortcomings, the opinion havers and wonks and beltway pressers have decided to groupthink their way into writing off democracy altogether. Its BEYOND frustrating to see! Like damn volunteer at a soup kitchen or smthn instead of being obsessed w the fact that i vote lol

Yes, and there are several reasons for that. First, despite all the factors that contributed to Trump's shock win in 2016 (anti-Clintonism, white backlash to Obama, general low voter enthusiasm, Russian disinformation, etc) we should never forget that until James Comey decided to announce 10 days before the election that he was reopening the EEEEEEEMAILS case, even though we all knew there was nothing there, she was leading fairly comfortably in the polls. And while we will never know how the 2016 election would have gone without that, which imho was one of the most unforgivable acts of blatant sabotage by a public official in American history, it's also true that we saw her poll averages start sliding almost in real time, as people who hadn't really been keen on voting for her anyway decided firmly not to and Trump was able to scrape out 16,000 votes across PA, MI, and WI to take the Electoral College. Which... we all remember how we felt that night, right? (Or in my case, early morning, since I was overseas?) We don't, we really, really don't want to feel that way again. Just saying.

As such, the media (which had already beat up Clinton nonstop during the BUT HER EEEEEMAILS saga) drastically overcorrected and as you say, began writing endless angsty handwringing pieces about Trump Voters in Rural Ohio Diners and giving endless sympathetic airtime to how "economically left behind" they felt, regardless of the fact that open racism, especially Obama backlash, was and remains the principal animating feature of Republican politics (since their only economic platform is that which makes very rich people even richer and Democratic economic policies are the only ones actually targeted at helping ordinary people). The hangover was so strong that even when Democrats had a massive 2018 midterm result and flipped the House blue for the first time since the post-ACA backlash lost it in 2010, the Conventional Wisdom was now beyond any doubt that Democrats were doomed for a generation or something, and not that Trump had squeaked out a fluky win (while losing the popular vote) due to endless Russian/Comey/third party-etc interference and wasn't actually that powerful. Even in 2020 when Biden was leading fairly steadily and things were going to hell with Covid, etc. etc. TRUMP IS UNSTOPPABLE, TRUMP IS GOING TO WIN.

(And now. Like. I know Trump thinks Trump won in 2020, as do a large majority of his cultists, but that doesn't mean he did.)

Even after that, when Roe went down in 2022, that made no difference to the RED WAVE COMING!!! narrative, and the amount of smug white male pundits insisting that abortion just wasn't very important and people weren't going to base their entire vote on it reached truly disgusting levels. We're now seeing the same thing with the constant "people won't vote for democracy and/or abortion rights" blast, when as you say, this narrative has just been completely made the fuck up by a lot of groupthinking DC media who are determined that this time, Trump really is going to win and then they get to be principled chroniclers in opposition or something. Not to mention, the basic principle of "democracy and abortion rights are good" do in fact win by thumping margins every time they're on the ballot, including in deep red states. But there is literally not a single piece of empirical evidence despite the massive amounts of it supporting the truth (i.e. that Democrats are doing historically well in competitive elections since 2018 and there's not really a major reason to think this will change in 2024) that will get the media to change the "Democrats in disarray and Biden Iz Doomed" horserace BS they so love. They don't like Biden because he's boring and competent and just does the job without being insane, because it's totally a great idea to treat American government like a reality show! (Recall the infamous comment by the CBS CEO who literally said that Trump was bad for America but great for CBS, because he pulled in high ratings and therefore lots of money and visibility for CBS. We live in the worst timeline.)

As such, the mainstream media has a vendetta against Biden, is determined that this time Trump is super definitely going to win and everyone will see how genius they are, and not-so-secretly wants Trump back because a) he's good for money and ratings, and b) because the media conglomerations are owned by oligarchs who have a vested interest in making sure that Democrats and their policies never get too popular. Notice how the once self-proclaimed centrist independent Elon Musk has turned into a rabidly alt-right fanboy ever since the Democrats really got serious about taxing billionaires as a key part of their platform. Likewise, insisting that Biden Iz Doomed makes Democrats nervous (and thus more likely to tune in) and Republicans gleeful (and thus more likely to tune in), so there's literally no incentive for the media to even try to report things accurately. You could create a very different narrative of the 2024 election if you just remotely bothered to write about things that have actually happened as they have actually taken place, rather than bending over backward to insist that Biden being four years older than Trump is a worse crime than 91 felony indictments, 2 impeachments, 1 insurrection, 450 million dollars and counting in punitive jury verdicts, more major criminal trials coming down the pipe, and just demonstrably being the worst human being alive in so many ways. I mean. Wow.

The good news, as I said in my other post, is that when people actually vote, these utter bullshit narratives get routinely blown out of the water, and that's a good thing. Because it turns out that unlike Super Smart Beltway Pundits' Super Smart Predictions, the average American does actually like democracy and freedom for women to make their own personal healthcare decisions, and they vote accordingly. So while yes, it's being made harrowingly much harder than it needs to be because of how much the media simply refuses to report that basic fact, and there is no amount of evidence that will convince them otherwise, at least we're trending in the right direction and, if we all pull our weight, can do it one more time. I realized the other day that I hadn't heard a fucking peep about Ron DeSantis in the last two months, and oh, how glorious it was. I yearn beyond words for the day (God willing, soon) when the same is true of Trump as well.

#anonymous #ask #politics for ts

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babydollmarauders · 9 months

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AUGUST PT 2 — QUINN HUGHES

quinn hughes x fem!reader

THIS IS A VERY LATE PART 2 TO THIS FIC

summary: in which y/n has been in love with Quinn for years and now she deals with the emotional consequences of a summer situationship.

specific lyrics: “you weren't mine to lose.” and “i can see us lost in the memory, august slipped away into a moment in time. 'cause it was never mine. and i can see us twisted in bedsheets, august sipped away like a bottle of wine. 'cause you were never mine.”

warnings: underage drinking

notes: this is almost five months late…. better late than never, right? ummm….. i hope y’all enjoy 🫣

**SEPTEMBER 21ST 2018**

the last week of this summer passed by in a blur. my final seven days being spent with Jack and his friends, and my nights being taken by his brother. i never did confess my feelings to Quinn, and as a result, i now sit back in my bedroom at home, watching snapchat stories of him at a party. my focus zeroes in solely on the girl clinging to his arm in the most recent picture. he wears a smile on his face and in the hand not occupied by the girl, he holds a generic red solo cup.

i have no right to feel jealous. to be so upset. he was never actually mine, no matter how much i wanted him to be. we were never exclusive. our rendezvous last month were just good times for him, and i knew that. so why did it still hurt? why did it still feel like my heart was broken?

i suppose i could chalk it up to the fact that he never clarified anything. he never outright admitted that our escapades meant nothing to him, but he also never said they meant anything either. however, they meant everything to me. they gave me hope that maybe he felt the same feeling that i’ve harbored for four years. but then he left with a simple ‘goodbye’.

i foolishly hoped that he would call me when he got back to school, that maybe he was just too nervous to say anything to my face, but now it’s 3 weeks later and the only Hughes’ i’ve heard from are his brothers. Jack texting me random updates of his life every day, and Luke and i speaking on the phone when i wished him a happy birthday earlier this month.

and i can’t make the excuse of ‘he’s busy.’ because i see him on social media, partying after wins and hanging out with friends between classes. he surely has enough free time to call me or even send a simple text. but, i suppose he doesn’t care to contact me because it never meant anything to him; and i guess he assumed it wasn’t anything to me either.

**NOVEMBER 16TH, 2018**

a glass of wine secured in my hand, i’m sat on the couch, scrolling through social media. my parents went out for a date night, leaving me with a house to myself for the night, and i’ve taken advantage by cracking open a bottle of wine and actually leaving my room. it wasn’t much, but i was relaxed. my thumb swipes over my phone screen, scrolling down my instagram timeline, and i stop at a picture of Quinn.

His arm is around a blonde girl’s shoulders as she hugs his waist, a small smile gracing his lips while she wears a large, toothy grin. it’s been months since i’ve last spoken with him, yet it doesn’t make it sting any less to see him with another girl. tears well in my eyes at the remembrance of his easy dismissal of me. the way that he left at the end of the summer with nothing more than a ‘bye.’

maybe it’s the adrenaline pumping through my veins, maybe the fact that i’m over feeling worthless over a guy, or maybe it’s the nearly entire bottle of wine that’s flushing through me right now; but i’ve finally had enough. swiping out of instagram, i scroll through my contacts until i find the one i’m searching for, my thumb hovering close over the call button but too hesitant to actually press it.

“this is stupid.” i mutter to myself, hanging my head. it’s in that moment that my dog decides to come over, sniffing me and nudging at the back of my phone, resulting in the tapping of the button. “shit!”

it’s too late now, the damage is done. he’ll get notified that i called him, regardless of if i were to hang up right now anyways, so i bring the phone up to my ear, listening to it ring. once. twice. a third time, before it connects.

“y/n? what’s up?” his voice is raspy and i wonder if i woke him. it’s only ten at night, but if i remember correctly, he has a game tomorrow, so it doesn’t surprise me that he would be asleep this early. i take a deep breath, mentally preparing myself for the words that need to be said.

“you’re a shitty person, you know that?” i surprise even myself with the anger that comes through with my words. my honest feelings being spoken.

“i’m sorry?” he sounds confused, but it’s not an actual apology, it’s more of an ‘excuse me?’ if anything.

“you heard me. you’re an asshole.” i tell him, rising to my feet to pace around my living room, my dog following me like a shadow. “i wish i had never met you.”

“okay, ouch, hold on, what did i do?” he questions. i hear shuffling in the background and i assume he’s sitting up in his bed now. “we haven’t even spoken in like, what? two and a half months?”

“exactly! that’s the problem!” i’m acutely aware that i’m raising my voice at this point, but i just don’t understand how he doesn’t see the issue with this.

“you’re mad at me because i haven’t talked to you lately? i still don’t understand.” i halt my pacing at his words, my dog bumping into the backs of my legs at my abrupt stop.

“i’m mad because you strung me along this past august. i’m mad because you left me with nothing but a simple ‘bye’. i’m mad because i’ve liked you for the past four years and then you didn’t even have the decency to explain to me whatever it was that we were doing this summer!” i huff. “i would’ve understood if you just told me it meant nothing to you. that you just wanted some action or whatever. but instead you didn’t tell me shit! you let me believe that maybe you liked me back. that maybe we could have been something. and then you just left me with radio silence and i have to see you on social media with girls hanging off of you and wonder if i just wasn’t good enough. that’s why i’m mad.”

Quinn is silent for a few moments, maybe holding out to see if i’m done, maybe gathering his thoughts, but it’s eerily quiet. but then as quickly as the silence started, it ends.

“y/n.” he sighs my name, sounding exhausted. “if i knew how you felt, i would’ve tried to define what we were doing. i wasn’t sure what was happening, just that i liked spending time with you and i liked being close to you.”

“being close to me? or fucking me?” i ask him.

“both, y/n/n. is that what you wanna hear?” he’s getting frustrated, i can hear it. “yes. i liked fucking you. and i liked being with you. just us two. i’m sorry that i didn’t call you, i thought that’s how you wanted it. but, i see now that i should’ve talked to you about it instead of assuming. i didn’t realize that what we were doing meant so much to you. but you could’ve ended it at any point.”

“why would you think i would do that? that i would end it? i’m literally telling you right now that i wanted more.” i heave out a breath, dropping back onto the couch and pulling my legs up to my chest. “Quinn, i just wanted you to call me. to say something, i don’t know! say you had fun this summer, say you can’t wait to see me next summer, say you like me, say you hate me, anything. just don’t go silent on me and make me think i’m insane for thinking you like me as much as i like you.”

“i’m so sorry, y/n.” he mutters, i quiet and slow. “i should’ve talked to you. i should’ve told you that i felt the same. i should’ve thought about how you were feeling and not just me. but now that i know, i’d really like to try.”

“you would?” i inquire, keeping my antsy fingers busy by picking at a stray string on my hoodie. “how?”

“maybe… maybe you could come to one of my games? and we could go out to eat afterwards?” he sounds unsure, like maybe he’s afraid i’ll say no.

“like a date?” i ask meekly.

“yeah,” Quinn chuckles and my heart picks up at the sound. i’ve always loved his laugh. “exactly like a date.”

i’m quiet, my bottom lip captured between my teeth, holding back a squeal.

“what do you think?” he pipes up again, once again seeming nervous.

“i think, i’d really like that.” i confess before burying my face in a throw pillow beside me, muffling my excited scream.

when i raise the phone back to my ear, Quinn is laughing; apparently the pillow didn’t cover as much of noise as i thought it would.

“next friday, i have a game against Wisconsin, does that work?”

“sounds perfect.” i grin, nodding my head, even though he can’t see me.

“okay, i’ll see you then?”

“i’ll see you then.” i confirm.

“goodnight, y/n/n. i can’t wait to see you.” he tells me and i repeat a ‘goodnight’ before we hang up.

i look down at my dog, who stares at me with his head tilted.

“Ollie, you are a matchmaker.” i coo, scratching behind his ears. his mouth drops open, his tongue falling out in content as i dote on him.

**November 23rd, 2018**

today is the day.

i spent all morning getting ready; my hair is done, my makeup perfected, and i tried on about six different outfits before my mother told me to stop worrying and just go.

and after a three and a half hour drive, in which i had to pull over twice to shake myself out and get my jitters out; i’ve pulled into Yost Ice Arena with 10 minutes to spare before the game starts.

Quinn and i have texted non-stop since we planned tonight, and he assured me last night on the phone, that there’ll be a ticket waiting for me at the front.

pulling the keys from the ignition, i grab my purse and do a once-over of my face in the rearview mirror before exiting the vehicle. stretching my legs, i make my way inside the arena, stopping to get my ticket before i head in towards the seating.

i’m sat towards the middle, a perfect view of the ice. my legs shake in anxiety as the crowd roars, the players filing on the ice and getting faceoff position.

it’s amazing how much i’ve learned about hockey in the past four years of knowing the Hughes’.

it’s a rather uneventful first period, neither team scoring. the second isn’t much better, Wisconsin scoring once mere minutes into the period, but that’s the only goal. Michigan ties it up in the third, with Quinn landing an assist on the goal, and i’m shaking in nervousness as i hope for a second Michigan goal. but it never comes.

moving onto overtime, neither team scores, resulting in a tie. but the teams still go on, starting a second overtime of three-on-three to determine who gets the extra point. it’s not even a minute into the second overtime when Quinn passes the puck to Josh Norris, who i’ve met once or twice at the lake house, and Josh lands the puck in the back of the net.

the crowd goes wild, me included, jumping up to our feet and cheering as the guys celebrate.

both teams file off of the ice relatively quick, and in result, the crowd begins to fan out. fans leaving the arena. but i stay back.

Quinn told me to meet him out front of the arena in half an hour, so i opt to lounge here for an extra few to kill time, scrolling through instagram and reading Jack’s texts; asking why i’m in Ann Arbor and if i plan to come see him before i leave. stupid Life360.

i call him rather than text, making my way out of the arena as he picks up.

“what are you doing in Ann Arbor?” he cuts straight to the point, not bothering with any catch up.

“well hello to you too.” i chuckle, rolling my eyes.

“yeah, yeah, hi. what are doing in Ann Arbor?” he repeats.

“i came to see Quinn’s game. i promise, i’ll come and see you tomorrow morning before i drive back home.” i assure him. “wait, are you even gonna be back from Illinois in the morning?”

“yeah, we’re on the bus back now.” he assures me.

“okay, good. i saw online that you got an assist! congrats bub!”

“thanks. we still lost though.” he tells me, his voice full of dejection.

“you’ll get ‘em next time!” i reassure, pacing outside Yost, pulling my jacket tighter to my chest to keep myself warm in the cool Michigan air.

“yeah.” he breaths. “so why are you at Quinn’s game?”

his tone is teasing, as though he doesn’t actually believe i’m here for Quinn.

“we’re going on a date.” i admit, preparing myself for his response.

“oooh! you’re finally getting out of the friendzone?!” he exclaims, and i can hear Trevor’s voice chime in from beside him, telling him to quiet down. which i find ironic, considering Trevor is ever the loud mouth.

“what?! you knew i liked him?!” i question, making him chuckle.

“uh, yeah. it was so obvious.” he replies through laughter. “i also know you were hooking up with him this summer. you weren’t very subtle.”

my jaw drops in astonishment.

“we were so subtle!” i shout, and i can hear Trevor piping up again on the other side of the phone.

“who? y/n and Quinn? oh yeah, everyone knew.”

“shut up, Zegras!” i yell, and i can hear both boys bark out in laughter.

“why didn’t you say anything?” i ask.

“who was i to say something, when you were trying so hard to keep it on the down low?” he teases.

i look up from my pacing feet when i hear footsteps, locking eyes with Quinn, who smiles at the sight of me, nearly taking my breath away.

“i gotta go.” i breath out, and Jack lets out an immature ‘oooooooh’

“have fun with my brother!” he calls out and i groan.

“shut up. i’ll see you tomorrow.” i sing, before hanging up.

“my brother?” Quinn questions, as if he already knows the answer.

“yeah.” i nod. “apparently, i found out, we weren’t as subtle as we thought, in August.”

“we were so subtle!” he exclaims, making me giggle.

“that’s what i said!” i tell him. his hand reaches out towards mine, and i anxiously intertwine mine with his. “so, where are we going?”

“there’s a really cute diner, about a fifteen minute walk from here.” he explains, as we begin walking. “i figured we could go there.”

“sounds perfect.” i breath out. his eyes are glued to the cement, watching his feet, but i watch him. “congrats on the assists! i know a tie wasn’t really the outcome you guys were hoping for, but it was a riveting game.”

he laughs, his head dropping back, and a bright smile overtakes my lips at the melodious sound dropping from his.

“babe, there were only two goals in a full hour of game play.” he reminds me.

“babe?” i question, and his hand tightens around mine for a second.

“yeah.” he shrugs, attempting to seem nonchalant, but i can tell by his face, when he turns to me, that he’s nervous. “you’re my girl now.”

“i’m your girl?” i smirk. “i like the sound of that.”

“me too.” he brings us to a halt, turning his body to mine.

his hand rises to cup my cheek, his face lowering to mine until our breaths mingle together. my eyes flutter shut, slowly, and the next thing i know, his lips are crashing against mine in a deep kiss.

and i know, in this moment, i’ll do anything to keep him. because now, he’s mine to lose.

#quinn hughes #quinn hughes x reader #quinn hughes imagine #quinn hughes blurb #quinn hughes fic #vancouver canucks #nhl fic #nhl blurb #nhl imagine #faithlynn’s writings <3

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2goldendarkness · 6 days

Text

I usually reblog, rather than make my own posts, but seeing everyone in the gaze community deal with their grief by writing things down has given me some courage to do the same. I hope it will help me in my grieving process and i hope to help everyone who does relate to what i write. So this will be my farewell letter.

Dear Reita,

I got the news seven days too late, like how it usually is for me coming into a fandom.

I became a fan about 8 years ago, i was doing a creative education as a designer, listening to random music on Youtube with autoplay. Suddenly i found Red, the first song that got me into the Gazette, i was glued to my screen and intrigued with the looks of all members. But why the hell was that one guy wearing a band around his nose? I needed to get into it. So i did.

The gazette then became my first and favorite Visual kei band, i’ve been trough a lot in my life and whenever hardship struck me, there was always an interview that would make me laugh. When i had boring days in school we even played a game, my friends would ask me “why is he covering his nose?” And i would make up the weirdest stories on the spot. That resulted in some charms with titles like ‘reita and the smelly drummer.’ And ‘reita the drugs dealer.’ It varied from poking fun and making up the stupidest thing, to making you some cool guy who fought bad guys. It would always make us laugh, even though, i was making up these stories to friends who weren’t even necessarily in the fandom, because everyone who saw you once, knew your name and so knew who you were.

I wrote fanfiction, many in where you play a big part of the story, not as a love interest, but as a brother of a character based off of me. All because you once said in a radio show that you feel like you’d be a great older brother, hell did i take you up on that one.

I never got to see The Gazette live, i used to curse you all for skipping my country and forcing me to travel for 5 hours to see you all. In 2018 i was almost at that point, but i couldn’t go because of my exams and because i had no friends who wanted to come with me. I always promised myself: one day, i will see them.

It hurts me to realize that day will never come, at least you won’t be there anymore. I accidentally open instagram, and find a grief post written by Hiroto of Alice nine, in the hashtags your name. Shock, that’s the first thing i felt. I must be going crazy. But next up was Miyavi’s post and as i read that it slowly starts downing upon me, my heart sinks to my stomach and a lump forms in my throat as i rush to jrocknews to confirm they aren’t just playing a sick joke.

I start crying like most of the sixth guns, but only after i start reading the members messages. Why am i crying? We’ve lost a talented bass player who inspired so many people to also start making music. The world lost ‘the world’s Reita’ who was always poking fun at the drummer. The bookstores lost their most unexpected romance buyer. Many lost their source of love and joy. I’ve lost my fictional brother.

But most importantly, your actual family lost a loving family member who bought his mother an entire house to repay her for raising him well. The Gazette lost a member. Kai lost his fear during interviews of whatever you are going to say next. Ruki lost being in your personal space no matter how big the dressing room. Aoi lost the person who’s jokes he could laugh the hardest about. Uruha lost his longtime best friend, and now can no longer feel your heart racing before the show, nor can he feel your hand searching for his heart.

I hope everyones feelings reach you, i hope that whichever way you passed, was peaceful and without pain. I hope that whenever it is our time, you come in your mustang to pick everyone up. Usually as a driving instructor i call shotgun, but i’ll leave that space to your close relatives. That way i can’t judge you for turning around while parking, rather than using your mirrors.

Thank you for everything Reita, you will never be forgotten. Once my grief is gone, i promise to remember you with a smile rather than cry. I also promise to be a fan of The Gazette no matter what they decide to do now you’re gone.

And to whomever read my entire message, thank you for reading this unhinged post.

#rip reita #personal #the gazette

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hiperacid2 · 5 months

Text

A letter from one's aching heart.

╰┈➤ nanami kento x reader ･ﾟﾟ･｡ wc: ~600

╰┈➤ post shibuya 2018 incident, spoilers for the recent s2 ep (18), gender neutral!reader, angst, mostly hurt/small amounts of comfort, grief, unedited . ･ﾟﾟ･｡posted on ao3!! ･ﾟﾟ･｡ @bitchcraftinc ੈ♡˳

"I've lived and I've loved, I've drank bitter and cold coffee, and I've drunk it warm and sweet too. Lately the world lost its color, and with it the respite of love went away. Maybe it's still there, in the way I still cook, make coffee, load the laundry, buy takeout, and more; everything for two. I keep forgetting I'm going to wake up in an empty, cold bed, that my towels won't ever be warm again when I get out of the shower; sometimes I speak waiting for a response, but what answers me is the silence of a hollow house. I keep saying 'I'm home!' with a smile every once in a while, but then again, hollowness is all I get back. Sometimes I wonder if things could be different, if we could have had an eternity of warm embraces and late sunday mornings. Wondering is futile, you taught me that, what matters is the present, the now. There's days where I buy myself a flower bouquet and put it in your favorite vase, the one that I think is boring and dull, and other days I treat myself to a dinner date, always pouring something for you too; I hope you're enjoying that. Don't worry about me, I'm doing good, it seems I was prepared to live without you, it's so hard, but I'm doing good. Though I loathe the day your clothes stop having your smell, I keep spraying your cologne in your pillow, hoping that the smell brands itself in my brain. I've had no luck yet, maybe if I try harder I will achieve it. I hope you forgive me, but I made one of your ties my lucky charm that I tied to my bag, and I had to cut it in half, with the rest I made a bracelet which I use almost every day, hoping to have a piece of you with me always, at least physically. Maybe I will adopt that little kitten, the one you insisted I should stop feeding. His mama vanished, and he's doing relatively good by itself. But I have all this love inside me that is for you, overflowing and drowning me; it seems to like the charm made out of your tie because they always play with it when I put my bag down. Even when you're not around you still are a magnet of strays. …I am making this longer than I planned, maybe I will write you another letter next week, or when I feel ready. I hope you don't mind the ink a little smudged because I'm crying. With love, always and forever, until we meet in another life, Kento."

You carefully folded the letter, chest full of sobs and tears completely clouding your vision. Nestling the pen you just used against your chest carefully, it's weight heavy in your hands, is Nanami's favorite.

After calming down enough to move, you take the folded paper and move it next to the plain cream vase that now holds half wilted flowers, leaving it there, with the pen over it as a weight.

Grabbing your bag as you take a tissue from beside the door, you put on your shoes. The keys on the door jingle, a solitary keychain with now no pair dances. Closing the door, your next destination is the pet store, the kitten is going to need a lot of new things… absentmindedly you wonder what name would suit them as the sounds of the city engulf you.

╰┈➤ a/n: this has been rotting in my docs since SEPTEMBER !! i'm so happy to finally release it here into the wild, it's not much but im thinking about grief and him allllllll the time. thank u for reading!! ♡

reblogs are greatly appreciated

#nanami x reader #nanami x you #nanami kento x reader #jjk x reader #jujustsu kaisen x reader

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tinydeskwriter · 1 year

Text

CINEMA {Chapter II}

A/n: know that Anne announced her father’s passing on the 23rd, but a little digging on the internet pointed out that Brian passed on the 21st of August of a infection at 86 years old. I don’t thing they would announce it before a funeral and service have already been held due to media and public interest in Harry. Also, quick note that London is 8 hours ahead from LA. word count:2425

CINEMA | Previous Part

TONIGHT IS GOING TO BE THE LONELIEST

The 21st of August was the saddest day of 2021 for Harry.

Perhaps one of the saddest of his life.

It started early in the morning, on their daily video-call Anne had commented that Grandpa Brian was not doing well—a mixture of his Parkinson’s disease, diabetes and the poor health that plagues old age—that they had better start preparing for the worst.

He was clearly shaken after the call, pensive, if not a little catatonic with the news, grandpa Brian was one of Harry’s people in the world, and after meeting the old man in 2013 it became clear to Y/n where so many of Harry’s’s most endearing personality traits came from.

Y/n tried to distract him by taking him out of the house, ‘enjoy the last days of summer’ she told him. They went to the beach in Malibu and enjoyed iced tea from their favorite little coffee shop sunbathing on the golden sand, her head on his lap as they talked about their next few months and plans to visit each other while his tour was on the road, and they had lunch in a nice vegan place. No paparazzi to bother them and they just got recognized on three occasions by Y/n’s far more controlled fans.

It was shortly after they got back to the house that Harry received Anne's second call that day to inform him that grandpa had passed away a few moments before.

Apart from all the grief, the saddest part was that Harry wouldn’t be able to attend the funeral to pay his respects and say a last goodbye to his beloved grandfather.

Y/n’s heart broke for him.

There is something truly heartbreaking about seen someone so full of life and love, so sad and grief stricken. His grandfather may have been frail for a while now, but nothing never truly prepares you to lose someone you love so much.

Harry and Y/n have been at each others side through some amount of grief and loss over the years. Harry had been with her when she lost her grandmother in 2013, and again in 2018 when her beloved grandfather passed away—the only family members she had been close to, with her parents to busy with their careers, and older half-siblings that didn’t care much for her—, and she had being with him after Robin’s passing in 2017, getting in the first flight back home from Canada just to be by his side as they buried his stepfather.

Due to COVID health guidelines it was impossible for Harry to attend the funeral, even if they waited the maximum period for the burial and religious ceremonies it would still not be enough time.

Y/n stood by his side, hands intertwine with his, as he talks to his mom and sister.

“They’re burying him tomorrow afternoon, there is no real reason to wait longer.” He tells her as he ends the call. “I will be attending the service through Zoom.” He says with a humorless laugh.

Y/n’s heart sinks as she sees Harry’s red, teary eyes.

“Oh, my Love…” She wrapped him in her arms, allowing him to mourn.

He remains in her arms for a while before pulling away kissing her forehead, their hands still intertwined.

“I need to call Jeff and the rest of my family.” he says sniffling, her thumb caressing the back of his hand.

His eyes dart out to where they're intertwined. Her elegant, small, pale hand intertwined with his larger, tanned hand.

“Do you want me to call someone?” She asks in an almost whisper.

His eyes return to her face.

“Can you call Mitch and Sarah, please? Let them know…” He asks looking her in the eyes.

“Of course my love.” Y/n she agrees, nodding her head. “I will text Luis, ask him to bring mourning clothes for you from the rental.”

Harry looks at her gratefully and remains silent for a moment.

“I do not want to be alone.” He confesses after a while.

“I am here.” She assures him, her free hand travels to the back his neck and Harry lowers his head, touching his forehead to hers. “I will always be here.” She promises.

He agrees, kissing her forehead again and excusing himself to go make phone calls.

Y/n walked through the familiar long halls of her house, her office was right next to the music room, a space that did double duty as an office and library—she knew Harry was probably in backyard—two of the walls had floor-to-ceiling shelves with all the books Y/n had ever read, and the collection he had inherited from his grandparents, a Guglielmo Ulrich desk occupied almost all the space in front of the huge window overlooking the side garden, an Urban Outfitters desk chair and G. Zema's Anemone armchairs being the only places available to sit in the room.

The actress closes the door behind her with her cell phone and address book. Before anything else, she orders flowers to be sent to Anne with a condolence note, and a wreath from the same flower shop in London that she had used years ago for her grandfather's funeral—the owner of the business was a discreet lady.

She sent a text message to Luis asking him to bring Harry mourning clothes, explaining that his grandpa Brian had passed away.

Harry never really did well alone, he always needed to be surrounded by friends, so Y/n spends the next few hours talking to Mitch, James, and Glenne, inviting them to come for Harry’s grandfather’s service, she texts Gemma asking for as many photos of Harry with his grandfather as she can get, and order flowers to be brought to her house the next day. If Harry can’t go to his grandfather service, she intended to do something nice for him so he would be able to say goodbye.

Her Love deserved no less.

Y/n only realizes the late hour when Luis shows up at the house with Harry's clothes and a Nobu bag.

“I figured dinner would be the last thing on your minds.” Says Luis as he passed everything to Y/n's hands and greets her with a kiss on the cheek. “Got H’s favorite.”

“Thank you so much baby, I didn’t even notice the time.” The young woman smiles at him.

“How is H?” The assistant asks a little worried not seeing his boss anywhere around.

“The last time I saw him he was still on the phone talking to his family.” She says placing the suit bag on an armchair in the living room and carrying the bag of food into the kitchen, leaving it on the island. “Are you coming tomorrow?” She asked in a lower voice.

“Of course, totally.” The man nods, “Do you need me to bring anything?”

“I have everything under control, just show up for brunch.”

“Alright, Y/n/n, I need to get going, but text me if you guys need anything.” Luis squeezed her shoulder in farewell. “Hug H for me, will you?”

Y/n escorts Luis to the door and then goes looking for Harry around the house.

The first thing that struck her when she walked into the music room was the unmistakable smell of tequila and whiskey through the room. The second thing that struck me was the music. Harry was playing some messy, off-key blues that was both making her sad and also making her ears metaphorically bleed. He didn’t even notice Y/n ’s her presence until she was almost in front of him.

“Lovie!” He smiles drowsily, abandoning the piano keys to turn to her.

Y/n's heart tightens in her chest as she takes in the sweaty hair and bloodshot eyes, there were tear marks on his face and Y/n just knew he had been crying.

“Oh My Love! How long have you been here?” She eyes at the nearly empty bottle of whiskey, and the uncapped bottle of tequila.

“I love you, babe.” Harry said against the fabric of her clothing. “You are the fucking love of my existence.”

“I love you too H.” She lifted his face to look him in the eye. “You are the other half of my soul.” She says making him give a drunken smile.

“Why did we broke up?” He asks, his drunken smile suddenly gone.

Y/n sighs, feeling a little drained at the thought of having that conversation with a Drunk Harry.

Why did they broke up?

He had broken up with her, it would be a better way to say, she had just accepted his choice so she could keep him in her life. They’re too young too be so serious about each other, was his reasoning.

“H, let’s go to bed.” Is what she chooses to says, there was no point talking about their past with him so drunk.

“Promise you won’t leave.”He demands.

“Never in a million years.”

****

Harry woke up alone in their bed—since when their bed became a synonymous for her bed—to the smell of fresh tea and sunlight streaming into the bedroom. His cellphone was charging on the bedside table along with a few tablets for his hangover—he smiled at that—he only had a few unread messages of condolences from other family members and some more close family friends, who are probably informed by either his mom, Jeff or Y/N.

He gets up stretching his back, deeply regretting having opened the drinks cabinet the night before. He showered and changed into the clothes left for him on an armchair—a Gucci double breasted black suit—.

The ‘Watermelon Sugar’ crooner found Y/n in the kitchen, in front of her custom sage green Aga Stove—after buying her dream mid-century house in LA, the model turn actress decided to renovate her entire kitchen and made it more ‘English’, it was the only thing she did really change at the house—in a black 'The Vampire's Wife' dress, he recognized because Olivia had the same dress in another print, Y/n had an apron on, protecting her clothes from anything that might fall on her, Dorothea, her cook, was nowhere in sight, Rebekah and Luis were sitting on stools by the island, both with their iPads in hand and coffee mugs in front of them.

Luis was the first to notice Harry in the kitchen entrance, getting up and offering his condolences to his boss on his grandfather’s passing, followed by Bekah.

Y/n takes the fry pan off the stove, spreading the vegan sausages and beacon onto a platter, before taking of her apron and going around the island, opening her arms to hug Harry.

“What’s this?” He asks, noticing for the first time what looks to be a full English breakfast spread arranged in porcelain plates around the kitchen island.

“This is comfort brunch… for you.” She says with a small smile, feeling a little silly with Harry looking at her so intensely and the two PA’s watching their interaction. “I want you to feel loved during your grieving moment, so…” Harry cut her off with a peck, cupping her face in his hands.

“Thank you, Lovie.” He thanked her with sincere honesty, hugging her.

“Why?” Y/n she looked at him confused.

Harry just smiled. That was just something so very Y/n to do…to do something just so caring and gentle, and just not seeing that it wasn’t simply what ‘anyone else would do’.

“Simply by being you.” His green eyes traveled across her face.

“Babes, why don’t you take H to the backyard?” Bekah interrupts them. “Luis and I will take the food.” Y/n gives them both a grateful smile taking Harry’s hand in hers and leads him to the backyard.

There’s an energy of intimacy that you wouldn’t tell they’re anything other than a couple, it was something in the way he followed her with blind trust, his eyes on her the entire time, or how her head was leaning slightly on his shoulder and she had his hand between hers. And to any of the thirty people in the backyard, they looked like some sort of beautiful quirky couple straight out of a Tim Burton movie.

His eyes are still following her across the lawn when they are separated by friends who wish to greet Harry and offer their condolences on his grandfather's passing.

Harry felt loved with so many of his friends showing up to support him. His whole band was there, James with his family, the Azoffs and the Gerbers, Tom and Jenny, Tyler, Jeff, Molly, even Nick and Lily, Niall showing up had been a surprise, but that was Niall.

Olivia was an unexpected presence, as they were in an awkward place in their relationship, she stayed close to James, Julia, Nick and Lily as he greeted them, Harry wasn't sure who had warned her, if it had been Jeff or James—he was pretty sure Y/n wouldn't have been, the two hadn't even said hello.

Of his close and dear friends, those not in attendance made themselves present with flowers and heartfelt messages. He was admiring the arrangements with Glenne and Jeff when he noticed what appeared to be papers hanging by ribbons from the English oak that Y/n had been given by a director years ago.

His band were admiring whatever it was with smiles on their faces. Harry's eyes again turned to the other side of the pool where Y/n was talking to Kaia.

“She organized everything yesterday.” Harry turned to Glenne who was looking in the same direction as him. “Have you seen the tree yet?”

“What are those hanging things?” He asked with some curiosity, heading towards the tree without even realizing it, Glenne beside him.

It was only when he was close enough that he realized they were photographs, most of him and his grandfather, some of the whole family, framed and hung from the tree with colorful ribbons. He glanced briefly at where Y/n stood before his gaze returned to Glenne.

“She texted Gemma yesterday, spent a few hours printing everything out, and this morning while you were sleeping, Jeff and I helped her frame and hang it up.”

They were interrupted by Y/n advising everyone to take a seat in front of the big screen that the service was about to begin, and they would be reunited virtually with the rest of Harry's family. For a second their eyes met, Harry smiled despite the moment, 'Thank you' he said mutely, to which she smiled back at him.

{next| coming soon}

Taglist: @slutforcoffein ; @lilsiz ; @pandxthings ;

@ameerakane20 ; @angywritesstuff ; @dzastinocha

#harry styles imagines #harry styles imagine #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles x actress!yn #harry styles x you #harry styles x reader #harry styles x singer!reader #harry styles x y/n #harry styles x model!reader

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tunedtostatic · 2 months

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Blog updates 2024 edition, or more specifically, one big, potentially very good update: Last year when I did my 2023 blog updates, almost but not quite a year ago now, I said I might be within a month or so of things no longer being in serious crisis/my life being basically okay-adjacent. It is hard to write this even now but it turned out that that didn't work out - things did get better, especially for a chunk of six months in the middle of the year when I had safe housing and things felt wonderful compared to the last few years, but neither external circumstances nor my own ability to deal with {PTSD, external circumstances, &c} got to the point hoped for where I would be able to say "I'm living a life where things are more or less normal and okay." Even though I never quite reached things being okay-adjacent during that chunk of months and things got not great again end of summer to now, having that time of things being close to almost okay-adjacent was a very important springboard to me for make it to a point now where I might be within reach of actually okay-adjacent.

Right now, what I said last year about potentially being within a month or so of things being basically okay is potentially true again, and I think I have a better shot at it this time for both external reasons and personal "knowing more about what to do to get safe and having my shit together" reasons. I might be within reach of things being okay-adjacent and feeling like I have a real normal life outside of crises (here defined as safe housing, employment, no people hurting me in my immediate vicinity, financial and scheduling ability to manage physical medical issues on a day to day basis while still eating without mental health issues getting in the way of that, clothing in drawers not trash bags, nothing actively medically scary).

If so this will be for the first time since 2018 so of course it's a big deal to me. Right now of course I'm both excited and relieved things might work out soon and terrified that they won't.

Meanwhile (the reason beyond updating that I'm posting this!), as I get ready to fully move into the place that will hopefully be the "safe housing" part of this, it's been really hitting me that even though living a life that is normal-adjacent and okay-adjacent will inherently be orders of magnitude better than the last 5+ years and of course I'm prepared to be extremely grateful for that, I'm still going to have all the grief and emptiness I have now. Even though I will as always be (too) busy in some ways trying to get everything done in a day while dealing with chronic pain, no longer having so much time soaked up trying to survive whatever the problem of the week or PTSD meltdown of the day is means that I'm going to have hours and hours of empty time to fill every week.

When I talk about loss I know some people's minds will jump to the worst case personal scenarios so I will clarify that I am fortunate that by grief I don't mean the death of an immediate family member, not that kind of grief. A lot of different things - people who have been awful, deaths, horribleness in my neighborhood that was like family, lost time, and all the losses prior to the last few years in some ways since grief doesn't fully go away, and then things like a close friendship breakup last year that is not as painful as any of the above since we are both alive and managed to be kind to each other throughout the breakup but it's still over. It has been hitting me that a lot of the work of grieving everything from the past couple decades, like the work of dealing with PTSD, is what I had to get through these past couple years to have a chance of getting my shit together, but now that I've made enough headway on the work of grieving to be able to have a chance at my life being okay, the losses and emptiness themselves will still be there ("still be gone"?)

If anyone has suggestions for fun stuff to do, book and movie recommendations, &c, it would be a really good time for them! If anyone can recommend social stuff, e.g. friendly good-boundary-having discord servers, that would be amazing. I think y'all know my favorite things in fiction and music (fiddles, writing fanfic that comes to a screeching halt 2-3 times a chapter to talk about food, thoughtful meditations on torture?, swords) but I'm usually down to at least give media outside my wheelhouse a try.

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foxes-that-run · 3 months

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Clean

I'm so sad we didn't get videos for 1989TV, but we did get some great visuals in the lyric videos. Especially Cleans, which references a lot of other songs. I see similarities to the music video for Style, Out of the Woods, Late Night Talking, Falling and Cardigan. I think this fits how often this song has been referenced in other songs by Harry and Taylor.

Timeline

Clean was written on 9 February with Imogen Heap. Taylor said in the Grammy Pro event:

“When you get your heart broken, or you loose someone from your life, or when you’re trying to recover from a breakup, it’s almost the same kind of struggle that someone goes through when trying to beat addiction. It’s not one habit your breaking, it’s every single minute of the day you’re breaking a habit. And it’s exhausting. I had this metaphor in my head about being in this house. There’s been a drought but you feel like there’s a storm coming, and so instead of blocking out the storm you punch a hole in the roof and just let all the rain come in. And when you wake up in the morning, it’s washed away everything that used to hurt you. And then you’re clean.”

Taylor also said it and Shake it Off were the last song's written, but Style was actually the last song written on 19 February 2014.

Live performances

Clean was on the 1989 mainset list proceeded by the Clean Speech which changed slightly every night. There is a wonderful Masterpost of Clean Speechs most of these. The Speech generally stated with a scene setter that they are all there together, going through things and would end with variations on " And then I think that if you continue to move through your life, and replace old habits with new ones, I think you can erase that feeling that everyone sees your mistakes when they’re looking at you. And that’s the moment you know that you’re finally clean." The middle section of the speeches varied depending on what Taylor wanted to say. I think these are a nice call back to Speak Now Arm Lyrics, which started after she may have first met Harry.

Since the 1989 World Tour it has been played Clean on:

21 July 2018 - end of (Cruel) summer end of Live on Tour, Camille BUA, Harry went to Italy, she went to Turks and Caicos with Joe.

1 April 2023 - show after Joe BUA

28 May 2023 - Between Maroon and Hits Different. TR and TK first seen soon after.

Lyrics

The drought was the very worst (Oh-oh, oh-oh) When the flowers that we'd grown together died of thirst It was months and months of back and forth (Oh-oh, oh-oh) You're still all over me Like a wine-stained dress I can't wear anymore

Is it over now? "With the wilt of the rose (Uh-huh)", Harry responded to this in Sunflower Vol 6 with "Plant new seeds in the melody"

Wine on clothes is many songs: Olivia: "This isn't the stain of a red wine, I'm bleeding love", Little Freak: "Red wine and a ginger ale / But you would make fun of me for sure", Maroon: "The burgundy on my T-shirt when you splashed your wine into me" and "Your roommate's cheap-ass screw-top , that's how", The 1: "Rosé flowing with your chosen family" and Grapejuice "There's just no gettin' through / Without you / A bottle of rouge"

Hung my head as I lost the war And the sky turned black like a perfect storm

Taylor has used war as a metaphor for a fight in several songs. And described dark skies for relationship trouble.

This Love: "Skies grew darker, currents swept you out again"

Coney Island: "Did I paint your bluest skies the darkest gray?"

Rain came pouring down When I was drowning, that's when I could finally breathe And by morning Gone was any trace of you, I think I am finally clean (Oh, oh, oh, oh)

The imagery of rain pouring down, washing away but also as a metaphor for depression has been a theme in Harry and Taylors songs. Most remarkably in the music videos for Falling/Cardigan, which references these lyrics in Clean.

Clean is referencing Everything has changed, a song about the start of Harry and Taylor's relationship, Clean being an (ending at that time.)

Everything Has Changed: "All I know is pouring rain and everything has changed"

How You Get The Girl: "Stand there like a ghost, shaking from the rain"

Peace: "But the rain is always gonna come if you’re standing with me"

There was nothing left to do (Oh-oh, oh-oh) When the butterflies turned to dust that covered my whole room So I punched a hole in the roof (Oh-oh, oh-oh) Let the flood carry away all my pictures of you

Everything has changed is also the only other song Taylor has referred to Butterfly's "And all I feel in my stomach is butterflies, the beautiful kind" which Harry referenced in Olivia "The summertime and butterflies / All belong to your creation / I love you, it's all I do"

Dust is also only in:

Holy Ground: And the story’s got dust on every page

Everything Has Changed: So dust off your highest hopes, and

Right Where You Left Me: Dust collected on my pinned-up hair

Finally, as the closing track, 1989 was a very photo driven marketing campaign, the line of 'washing my pictures of you' and references to photos in the album bring that story to a close.

The water filled my lungs, I screamed so loud But no one heard a thing

Harry referenced this line in the Falling Music Video, which Taylor then referenced in the Clean TV Lyric Video:

Ten months sober, I must admit Just because you're clean, don't mean you don't miss it Ten months older, I won't give in Now that I'm clean, I'm never gonna risk it

Clean likens their relationship to an addiction, which they do in several songs (Grapejuice "There's just no gettin' through / Without you A bottle of rouge", MMIH “gotta get better / give me some morphine.”)

Is it over now? "Let's fast forward to three hundred takeout coffees later" 300 take out coffees, one a day is 10 months.

The song was written 9 February 2014, 10 months prior was April 2013. One Direction was playing UK shows and Taylor on the US leg of the Red Tour. They were MIA on tour breaks 23 - 25 April 2013 after Harry arrived alone in LA, Harry wearing the Peace Ring when he left LA. Finding that timing makes me feel:

#haylor #taylor swift #1989

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rubythecrimsonwriter · 9 months

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ATC rewrite part 1 outline

The vote was 6-2 in favor of sharing, not counting my vote, so it's under a readmore for those who want to wait until I've finished the first chapter.

My outlines vary from story to story and they're usually quite odd, and take more of a condensed story format than a traditional outline with the bullet points and such. This truly is an outline. It reads like a story. I've embellished on parts that I currently have, glossed over the parts that I don't but know they need to be there.

For those who are new, or followed me from Flipping Legacies and never realized I wrote for other fandoms: Percy Jackson was my first fandom. I started All Together, Cousins in 2013, wrote about 80K words for it in two years, got burned out big time for Percy Jackson stuff. Technically speaking I updated it in 2018, but I'd completely lost the plot of it and relied on subplots and characters to keep it moving and it just. Wasn't fun. And around the time I started Flipping Legacies (in 2020) I'd also taken a look at ATC and kind of. Winced. You can tell a 15 year old wrote it. Happy ten year anniversary, old friend, the fic that haunts me in the night--I'm finally back.

I love the premise of it, but it's kind of like a 1940s house. The walls are cracking, the wiring needs to be updated, the plumbing needs to not be lead. It needs some work. A lot of work. And here's the start of it.

🗲

Thalia’s ten and Jason’s two when she snatches him out of Hera’s grasp, threatens a goddess with grievous bodily harm and bloody revenge schemes and runs like the proverbial bat out of hell. She tires quickly. It’s winter. They’re two Big Three demigods. Cops are not kind to homeless people, shelters are not kind to kids, and the system is even crueler.

Luke Castellan is a blessing, and she thanks Hermes every damn day for him. He’s great at getting out of tight spots, talented with a sword, gentle with her brother, and willing to fight her over what’s best.

He’s been on his own for three years now. He knows what he’s doing a lot better than Thalia does, in terms of actual survival. They bunk down in one of his old hiding spots and gear up and she’s so exhausted that she falls asleep almost immediately, Jason sprawled across her chest.

Never again. She’ll never again let Hera get that close. The sight of her brother in that woman’s arms will haunt her for the rest of her life.

She urges Luke to move faster, the next day, to get them farther away from the Wolf House, and they have a screaming match about I want to be as far away from this place as possible and Let’s not fucking pass out about it, that does nobody any good! and also What if she tries to take him again and Well they’re gods, it’s not like physical distance means anything to them.

Jason isn’t happy about the loud noise of a fourteen year old boy and a daughter of thunder going at it. That’s finally what gets them to shut up. Every demigod she’s ever met has backed down immediately after watching her zap her surroundings when she gets frustrated.

Luke has rubber soles, a steel spine, and a golden heart. How lucky is she, that he’s the full range of conductivity?

The positive and the ground, and together they can move mountains—or make sure that one little boy is safe and happy as is possible for a son of Jupiter.

🗲

Thalia’s twelve and Jason’s just turned four when Luke goes into a cursed mansion and never comes out again.

She straps Jason to her chest and circles the burned out husk of the mansion for any sign, any clue, any remnant of her friend and partner in raising both Jason and hell. She searches the house, then starts working her way out steadily until its more than a mile from the mansion in all directions and she has to admit defeat.

Luke is gone. Luke is dead. He wanted to see his future and Thalia wishes futilely that she had argued more with him about it.

She clings to Jason and weeps bitter tears. Then she pulls herself together and marches on. Anywhere but here. Tennessee, she’s heard, is hot and muggy this time of year, but Thalia feels like she’ll never be warm again.

Meanwhile, Luke has the shield of aegis, a lot more issues with the gods, a golf club, and a blonde little girl terrified of spiders.

🗲

Thalia’s just turned thirteen and Jason’s still four when she snaps her gum obnoxiously and says to the cashier who asked her why she’s not in school, “I’m seventeen, I have a half day before I go to work, and he’s four, dipshit. Now pack it up, I haven’t got all day.”

Her heart thuds in her ears, but Disinterested Teenager is the name of the game, and she’s the godsdamn master of it. Thick eyeliner, chunky mascara, and fake piercings do the rest to convince them. They’ve played this game a thousand times.

Three Big Three kids in a corner store is too much temptation for the monsters, though, and that’s how she meets Sally Fucking Jackson, who’s clear-sighted in every sense of the word.

🗲

Sally is a badass—not a word that Thalia applies to just anyone. Thalia also can’t stand to be around her for too long, because the woman has sacrificed everything to try and raise her son safely.

Seeing herself reflected—mother and son, sister and brother, who would kill or die or be abused to keep him safe and happy and well—is an ache like the cold. And she wishes Beryl had tried.

Is it a crime, to wish that she’d had herself or a Sally to protect her? Thalia thinks not, but it hurts much worse than stealing. She giggles at Jason and Percy arguing over cookies, swiftly removes Jason from Percy when it becomes clear that two small, angry Big Three children wreak havoc on indoor plumbing and HVAC systems, and high tails it out of there with Jason in tow when Sally offers them a place to stay.

Luke survived two years with her and Jason. Sally has her own son to think about living for.

Her eyes burn. She takes a deep breath and marches on.

🗲

Thalia’s fifteen and Jason’s seven and Thalia needs all her fingers to count how many issues she’s got going on currently.

It’s the middle of summer and it’s hotter than Hades’s asscrack, so she thought, “oh hey, it’s not like we’re not already nomadic, let’s go north for the summer and see Yellowstone and such.”

Yellowstone was great. Grizzly bears hate everything pretty equally, but avoid Thalia and Jason like the plague. That means that grizzly bears will happily maul a monster and leave them be. Thalia would like to stay here forever, please and thank you.

But then there was the fucking Fury that chased them to (not quite) hell and back, and Thalia packed them up and ran so far that they wound up in the mountains before they stopped for breath, and then hung out with the Hyperborean giants for a while. Hot Furies and freezing Hyperborean giants don’t mix well, apparently. And then Thalia figured, well, if she was already on the mountains, might as well see what the West Coast has to offer them.

The Fury caught up to them right as they were crossing the Nevada/California border, and Thalia just wants to say that it’s completely ridiculous how hot Nevada is. No place needs to be that hot during the day and that cold at night. A week later and they’ve run so far west that Thalia can taste the salt from the ocean in the air.

They’re out of places for them to run.

Thalia has silver plated hunting knives, handles wrapped with shredded old tires and fabric cushioning the edges. She’s blasted the Fury back with lightning so many times her hair is permanently standing on end and her fingers tingle.

There’s a girl in a purple shirt on the edges of the fight. Her mouth is dropped open like she can’t believe what she’s seeing.

Thalia has a few other things to worry about.

Then the girl comes back with more people in purple shirts and—and they’re armed. Armed with things that can actually hurt a monster.

The Fury shrieks and dives at them and the girl shouts, “Turtle formation!” and shields close around them on all sides.

What Thalia wouldn’t give for a shield. Or a proper weapon.

The Fury rakes its claws across the shields, clambers all over them like a really big, really weird looking lizard, and then almost gets skewered by a sword that pokes itself between a minuscule crack between the shields.

Thalia braces herself between Jason and the Fury, waiting for it to realize that there’s easier prey. Jason, weaponless, hugs her from behind and buries his face in her back.

She breathes deeply. She shivers in spite of the hot air—

A cold wind from the east. The Fury rises, sees them in the open, launches—

There’s a tendril that feels like lightning, a hot line of power. Her gut clenches. Jason shudders so hard he almost yanks her off her feet. The sky goes from blue to black and raging in an instant, and the thunderbolt that comes from the sky is as thick around as Thalia is, blinding and deafening everyone in the vicinity. The Fury vanishes in the lightning’s blaze, naught but golden dust and ash on the ground.

Thalia almost passes out. Her ears are ringing and she can barely see.

The girl in the purple shirt is very tall, Thalia thinks, before she realizes her knees have buckled under her and that the girl is probably a normal height. She’s saying something that Thalia can’t hear, but she can hear Jason yelling something indistinctly. She gropes around behind her, grabbing him.

“He’s my brother,” she says, loudly enough that she feels her own chest rumble. She might be too loud, but she’s guessing otherwise with how useless her own ears are. “He’s annoying but he’s my brother, don’t kill him.”

Jason socks her in the shoulder, so at least someone can hear something.

The girl says something, looking at Thalia. She thinks that the word take was somewhere in there, but reading lips has never been her forte. “You’re not taking him,” she says loudly. “I threatened to destroy Olympus the last time someone tried taking him from me, and I’m still not joking about that.”

“You did what,” was clearly audible, so that must have been screamed in her ear.

“Oh yes,” Thalia says with probably more satisfaction than is wise, considering Jason shaking her and the girl in the purple shirt looking at her with wide eyes. Her vision swims, but it’s been five years and the vicious satisfaction has not yet dimmed. “Dearly beloathed stepmother tried stealing you from mom. I fried her ass, grabbed you, told her if she tried that again I’d do my damnedest to bring Olympus to its knees, and ran. Haven’t seen her in five years.”

The girl, wide-eyed, brings both index fingers together parallel, and clearly says, “Both.”

Oh. Taking them both. That was fine. Nothing short of Tartarus could hold them captive together.

“That’s fine,” Thalia agrees, and immediately passes the fuck out.

🗲

Thalia wakes up with Jason on her right, looking like he’d been slapped with a live flounder while she was out, a blond man with a circular shield in front of them, and a pounding headache.

“Thals,” Jason whispers. “Can you hear me yet?”

She nods, moving her hand enough that he can feel it.

“Is there a monster that imitates dead people?”

What.

The blond in front of them—shielding them, in the most literal sense of the word—glances back just long enough to check on them and it’s long enough to see his profile and what the fuck.

“Luke?” she breathes, propping herself up on an elbow.

“What in the gods be damned Hades are you doing in California?” Luke hisses. “This place is like monster central, don’t you know better?”

“We didn’t exactly have much of a choice in the matter,” Thalia says dryly. “What are you doing alive?”

He glances back at them again, a crooked grin on his face. “You know me,” he says. “Always escaping by the skin of my teeth. Can we have this conversation later, without weird, culty demigods trying to grab you guys?”

Thalia looks up at the swirling clouds above them. She hates to admit it, but— “I don’t think I can walk.”

“Oh for—“ Luke exclaims. “Jason, buddy, hold this.” He unlatches the shield from his arm and passes it off to her brother. “You can terrify us with it later, until then, just keep pointing it at the purple people.” Then he reaches down and scoops her up with a huff of air. “You need to eat more,” Luke tells her as an aside. “Jason, north and east. I’ll follow.”

“Sorry I just spent the last two weeks fighting off a fucking Fury,” Thalia says sarcastically. “I shall endeavor to take a break and eat a hamburger every six to eight hours as my body demands—except wait, no, I can’t, because I have a literal demon from hell that wants to kill me because I had the audacity to be born.”

“You couldn’t have fried it before today?” Luke asks.

“You think I didn’t fry it like fifty times?” Thalia says. “You know, I know we’ve been apart for a couple of years because I thought you were dead, but I didn’t realize my temper was forgettable.”

Jason’s giggling in front of them.

“It’s really not,” Luke says, grinning. He looks back, even though Thalia can clearly see the purple people, as he called them, not following them. He sobers. “I looked for you.”

“I looked for your body,” Thalia says.

“I’m sorry.”

“Be sorrier.”

“Hey, who’s carrying who?”

“I fried a Fury. When you fry a Fury and don’t pass out, then you can talk.”

“Uh-huh,” he says. He sounds unimpressed, but she looks, and there’s both amusement and awe in his eyes. “I’ll take that under consideration. But really. I’m sorry. I knew that when I couldn’t find you, you’d think I was dead and I didn’t do more to let you know otherwise.”

Thalia wrestles with her temper and her hurt. “So why didn’t you?”

Luke shakes his head. “The explosion? Was my fault. It was the only way I could see myself getting out alive.”

Thalia remembers the old house suddenly exploding, going up like someone lit an entire matchbox on fire with Greek fire. There’s a certain shade of lime green that she hates to this day, and it’s entirely because of that.

“I got literally blown out of the house, managed to land in a dumpster and not on the metal roof next to it,” Luke continues. “Badly injured, vaguely flash fried, I’d broken my leg on the way out. I laid in the dumpster with some ambrosia trying get myself to heal for at least a day.”

Yikes. Big Yikes.

“By the time I managed to hobble out of the dumpster, our camp was gone. I went to the city to get some mortal bandages, trying not to burn myself out on ambrosia, and I went down an alleyway. There was a weird noise, and I wanted to investigate before I tried bunking down there for the night, and the next thing I know, there’s this little girl trying to take my kneecaps out with a hammer.”

Luke shakes his head, grinning to himself. “Her name’s Annabeth, she’s a daughter of Athena. She’s eight.”

What were the odds? Probably basically zero.

“What?” Thalia says.

“Yeah,” Luke agrees. “Nuts, right? Pretty sure either Hermes or Athena—or both—were keeping her safe. I convinced her I wasn’t a monster and got her to travel with me. She’s strong, so it was tough while I healed.”

“And then, like six months later, Clarisse found us,” Luke says. “Daughter of Ares, also really strong. The three of us racked up almost as many as the three of us did.”

Thalia winces.

Luke goes quiet. “There’s a camp, in New York,” he says slowly, “specifically built to handle and protect demigods.”

Thalia lifts her head.

“They send out satyrs to try and find demigods before—well, before we get overrun by monsters. And the three of us, roaming around the New England area with a horde of monsters on our tails? It was enough to attract some attention, especially when we were in New York City. Clarisse...she didn’t make it. But Annabeth did.”

Thalia couldn’t breathe.

“She’s safe, back at camp.”

“What are you not saying?” Thalia demanded. “That’d be the first thing out of your mouth. Why would we not be safe?”

“There’s a pact that your dad made, way back after World War II,” Luke says. “No more kids from the Big Three. The crack that you made, about having the audacity of being born? He broke his oath. But he’s immortal, so you pay the price.”

Luke twitches a bit, so Thalia holds her breath until she doesn’t have enough air to be mad.

“The campers there haven’t seen a child of the Big Three ever. Chiron, the centaur who runs the place, hasn’t seen a child of the Big Three since World War II. You guys die too fast. And, even worse, there’s a prophecy about one turning sixteen and potentially destroying the world.”

“Luke,” Thalia says, very calmly. “I need you to put me down.”

Luke sets her on the ground with gratifying speed.

Thalia draws her hunting blades and stabbed them into the ground and made ladders of electricity between them to try and not send off stray pieces of lightning to everyone else around her.

Thalia rests her head against the humming pommels. “Two years ago, Jason and I were in a corner store in New York when monsters attacked.”

Luke stills.

“I’d kicked butt not an hour prior, but it turns out that three Big Three kids is too tantalizing a prospect.”

Luke gasps. “How—“

“Poseidon had a son with a badass woman,” Thalia laughs hollowly. “His taste in women is impeccable, I’ll give him that. Percy’s eight. Him and Jason almost blew out the plumbing in the building arguing over a cookie, so I knew we couldn’t stay.”

“You—I’ve never heard you describe someone as badass, much less a mortal,” Luke says.

Thalia—sighs. “Yeah. She’s sacrificed damn near everything to keep him safe. I can respect that.”

She hauls in a deep breath and forces herself standing. She sways, her vision swims a little, but worlds better than earlier. She pulls her knives out of the ground, cleans off the dirt, and sheathes them. Luke stands behind her, to the left, arms hovering.

Gods, she’s missed him.

“I’ve missed you,” she says. Like a phantom limb.

“I’m so glad you’re still okay,” Luke says.

🗲

Luke goes back to Camp Half-Blood, quest unfulfilled, and brings Annabeth out of the borders. Chiron and Grover come with them, and it’s a very nervous daughter and son of the sky god that they meet.

“Annabeth, Clarisse, Grover, the first bunch I ran herd on,” Luke says fondly, ruffling Jason’s hair. He pats the tree next to him. “Thalia, Jason, this is Clarisse, Annabeth, Grover, and Chiron.”

Annabeth scowls at Jason first, then Thalia. “I’m coming with you,” she announces.

Grover let out a quiet sound of horror. Which, fair. Cute kid, but Thalia had enough work with Jason, and she refuses to endanger a third strong demigod again.

“Um, no,” Luke says firmly, but gently. “You’re not coming with us.”

“You’re not coming with Jason and I, either,” Thalia says, cutting that off at the trunk.

Luke whirls around. “I just—“

“We had to watch you die once already,” Thalia says icily. Annabeth goes white. “Forgive me for not wanting to repeat the experience, with no guarantee that you’d appear out of nowhere three years later.” She tucks her brother closer to her. She softens, just a bit. “We’ll visit,” she promises.

“You would not stay?” Chiron asks.

Thalia glances at the demigods on the other side of the barrier. “Stay in one place that’s constantly watched by the gods. We’d be dead on the inside of a month. Thanks for the offer, but no thanks.”

She sees the brief look of confusion on Chiron’s face and immediately glares at Luke. “You didn’t tell them?”

“It’s none of their business if you’re not going to stay anyway,” Luke says practically. “Annie knows. Clarisse didn’t. I’m pretty sure all they can smell is that you’re strong demigods, not your parentage.”

Thalia eyes them dubiously. “Thalia, daughter of Zeus,” she introduces herself shortly. “And my full-blooded brother, Jason. I’m fifteen and I threatened Hera with the end of Olympus five years ago if she tried taking him from me. I suddenly see why she took my threat seriously.”

Grover chokes on a laugh. Annabeth kicks him in the shin and scrutinizes Thalia. “The gods are better than the other options,” she says seriously. “But kicking them probably wouldn’t hurt. Much.”

Thalia grins at her. She looks at Luke. “You’re right, I like her.”

“So I can come with you,” Annabeth says confidently.

“No,” Thalia says. “But, even if me kicking them doesn’t work next year, I have a mission for you.”

Luke frowns at her in askance.

“In like, four to seven years, Beth, this will be very important, so listen carefully,” Thalia says slowly. “There will be a boy who comes to camp, probably beat to Hades and back and probably grieving. I need you to befriend him.”

Annabeth looks puzzled. Chiron looks politely confused. Grover looks utterly befuddled. Luke looks like she’d slapped him with a hagfish and then offered him some sunflowers: astonished, disgusted, and delighted, all at the same time. Jason starts laughing.

“Thals,” Luke says, obviously trying not to laugh.

Annabeth looks at Luke and then back at Thalia. “It would be a prank on them?”

“It would be a kick in the face,” Thalia corrects. “He’s nice. Perhaps a little slow on the uptake sometimes, but he respects the women in his life.”

She considers this. “Four to seven years? I’d be twelve to fifteen?”

Thalia nods.

“Okay,” Annabeth decides. “If I don’t like him I can kick him though, right?”

“He’d probably deserve it,” Thalia agrees. “But don’t do it if he doesn’t deserve it.”

🗲

Thalia’s fifteen and Jason’s eight and they’re in Tennessee when an old dude named Fred approaches them. “That wasn’t very nice to set them up like that. Funny, though.”

Thalia glances to the side and sees the golden sunshine yellow of his iris. “They have a habit of setting us up to fulfill their rivalries. I’m just breaking the cycle.”

Jason peers around her from the other side to see who she’s talking to. He seems puzzled at who the stranger is, but cautiously says, “Hey, cousin.”

A hilariously safe bet.

Apollo seems to thinks so, too, because he guffaws once before he says hi back.

“But seriously, the kid’s got enough problems, you want to add to his list?” Apollo says.

“Luke was the best thing that ever happened to me, short of Jason,” Thalia says. “Someone who will argue with him rather than agreeing to everything will do them both a world of good.” She pauses. “I’m not the child of the prophecy. Am I.”

It’s not a question.

“You could be,” Apollo says finally. “Basically any time after you turn sixteen. But while some Old things are stirring, none of them are close to waking. There’s nothing happening that would aid you in Olympus’s fall, and nothing that would topple it that you’d be able to preserve.”

He pauses. “Between you and me?”

“And Jason,” Thalia says.

“And Jason,” Apollo agrees. “Prophecies can be fulfilled in a lot of odd ways. Ideas, you know, last beyond a mortal lifetime. Maybe you preemptively introducing that troublemaking pair will destroy an idea that Olympus holds sacred. Some things need to be changed, otherwise it will spell our end.”

Thalia glances at him and quirks a sarcastic smile. “Good thing I’m dyslexic.”

“Yes,” Apollo agrees, completely serious in the face of her joke. “Good thing that you are.”

She covers Jason’s eyes as Apollo goes supernova and they’re left alone in Nashville.

🗲

Jason’s eight and today is Thalia’s birthday, and Sally has taken the four of them out to a restaurant to celebrate when everything…

Well.

Thalia would say when everything goes to shit but it’s really when they reached the proverbial fork in the road. Or perhaps, when everything changes.

It starts with the restaurant’s door chiming open, with a woman’s gracious voice waving off the waitstaff saying, “My party is already here, thank you.” And she walks closer to them, a brown woman in a white business suit with a shirt that shimmers blue and green and purple. Her brown heels clack on the stone pavers that make up the floor.

She stops at their table and slides into the booth next to Thalia.

Across from her, Sally picks up her steak knife in a move that’s undeniably a threat. Thalia fucking loves her.

“Hera,” Thalia says evenly, making a show of going back to her menu. “I know immortals have a screwy sense of time, but I do believe you’ve managed to pick the worst possible time to have a confrontation. Congratulations. That takes some true talent.”

Hera reaches out and snags Sally’s menu that Sally is completely ignoring in favor of glaring metaphorical daggers at the goddess while threatening her with a steak knife. Thalia absently sends a prayer to both Apollo and Hermes. They both cover such a wide variety pack of stuff that one of them should cover badass but also kind and occasionally stupid mortals.

“On the contrary,” Hera says. “I believe this is the perfect time. We are constrained by polite society, so we must at least appear to get along.”

Thalia lowers the menu to look at Hera, and then swing her gaze at Sally. Hera lowers her stolen menu at the long look, and then sees the attempted threat. “Ah. Well. Some of us are constrained by polite society. I see that others don’t apply.”

Thalia takes a deep breath. It feels like it goes deeper than usual, somehow, like her guts have made way for her lungs. And, like magic, Thalia’s water tips over without anyone touching it and spills all over Hera.

Thalia hasn’t got a drop on her.

That—it felt like she did that, not Percy. Percy looks almost as startled as Thalia feels, safely sandwiched in between Sally, the table, and the wall. Hera makes a disgusted noise, taps her fingers along the menu, and the water vanishes. Thalia reaches out and rights the cup slowly.

“Lady, you’re probably the only one in polite society,” Thalia says bluntly. “Say your piece and get out.”

“Very well,” Hera says. “When I tried to take Jason six years ago, you told me that you would destroy Olympus if I succeeded to get him back. Does that still hold?”

“Yes,” Thalia snarls. Her fingers clench the menu in her hands and it feels like she’s holding onto a live wire now.

“Is that the only reason why you would even try?” Hera presses.

“Don’t fuck with me, Hera,” Thalia says. Her voice slides into a lower register that’s meant to be heard over a horde of monsters, but she still only speaks just above a whisper. “I have only ever wanted to be left alone by you people. Leave me and mine be and we won’t have an issue.”

“You and yours being?”

“The people at this table and Luke and his second family—Annabeth, Clarisse, Grover,” Thalia says. “Is that your game? You want to see who you can fuck over without me triggering the prophecy?”

Hera goes silent and Thalia knows she’s hit the nail on the head.

“You listen well, Hera, goddess of marriage,” Thalia says. “If I found out one of my people died because you’re so short sighted and possessive of a husband that has never and will never respect you, I will bring the prophecy down on all our heads, chop you into a gazillion pieces as Zeus did to Kronos, and toss you into Tartarus myself and let you rot with grandfather. If you insist on sharing his mental issues, you can share an unliving space with him as well.”

Hera’s jaw is clenched and her lips pursed together.

“How about,” Thalia continues, “you learn about this novel thing called communication, and possibly divorce. It’s the twenty first century, step mother, aunt, cunt, whatever you’d like me to call you. Women have rights, women have therapists, and women have divorce lawyers. Zeus was around for my childhood, I actually know the decrepit prick. I can’t imagine being around him for three thousand years and not straight up murdering him. If you have an issue with me besides me being born—which, I’ll remind you, I actually had no say in—not kidnapping my brother is a great way to start a conversation.”

Jason chokes on a laugh about reminding the goddess of marriage that she has no say in herself being born. Thalia silently tells him to shut the fuck up before Hera remembers his existence.

“The gods are not allowed—“

“Then it’s a great thing that you’ve never had demigod kids, so you can safely interact with demigods that are not your kids. Which is all of them.”

Thalia pauses. “Goodbye. I’m celebrating surviving to sixteen. You are not invited.” She waved down a server. “Could I get another water? I was really thirsty,” she says guilelessly.

Sally visibly swallows a laugh as Hera rises. Definitely not running from being threatened with more ice water on her suit. Nope. Definitely not.

“Your disrespect,” Hera says severely, “is only matched by your loyalty.”

And then she vanishes.

“Well, that went swimmingly,” Thalia says brightly. “I want lad naa.”

Sally sets down the knife carefully and then rests her head on the table.

🗲

(the mental image is too funny: a pristine business woman, a teenager with the nineties grunge aesthetic, two eight year old boys, and a mom in mom clothing sit down in a Siam restaurant.)

🗲

It’s when Thalia delivers them all safely back to the Jacksons’ apartment that she asks Percy quietly, “The water spilling. Was that—?”

“It wasn’t me,” Percy says uncertainly. “I dunno. It didn’t feel like me.”

“It felt like I did it,” Thalia says. “But that’s not my power.”

“Maybe the air pushed it over,” Jason says.

Thalia pauses. The air is their domain. She doesn’t remember any weird gusts of wind, but she was also very focused on not frying someone and also making sure Hera didn’t do something stupid, like try kidnapping Jason. Again.

“Maybe,” she says. But she doubts it.

🗲

Thalia’s seventeen and Jason is nine when they see the Jacksons again, a whole year and a half later. They celebrate Percy’s tenth birthday in a cabin on Montauk, and while Thalia’s supervising the boys playing in the surf, she can hear...something. In the cabin.

Sally is taking a well-deserved nap, or she’s supposed to be. Instead, she sits on the bed and bows her head over a head of dark, curly hair, attached to a tanned man kneeling in front of her.

Thalia shuts the door again just as quickly and guns it.

Later, she thinks, and wonders—that’s real devotion she saw there. That was I missed you and come with me? and he is beautiful. She naps under the sea of stars, one boy under each arm, and she can rest easy knowing that neither can be stolen away without her knowing immediately.

There’s a shush of displaced sand, and Percy shifts under her arm, and she cracks an eye open. She assumes its Sally, but its Poseidon, who rests a large hand on Percy’s forehead and looks awed and wistful.

He sees that she’s awake, a split second after she’s seen the heartache and longing on his face, and smiles at her ruefully. Thank you, he mouths, and dissolves into a salty sea breeze.

🗲

There’s an entire pack of hellhounds to deal with in the morning. Thalia picks Jason up with one arm and Percy with the other and hurls them both into the shack calling itself a cabin with Sally.

There’s a lot of yelling about her decision, but Percy has never been trained, Sally is a mortal, and Jason is nine. She can do this.

She can do this, right?

She draws her hunting knives and her power up from her gut and they crackle with lightning immediately.

Thalia gives them the run around, around and around and around the beach and over and behind the shack and into the surf. She’s dusted four already, starting to drag a little with the many scrapes and scratches and near misses that she’s acquired, and regrets taking off her leather jacket. She stabs another and somersaults off a dissolving back into the surf.

She hoists herself to her feet, ankle deep in the lapping waves. She sets her jaw, takes a deep breath, and braces herself. Another three. She can do three hellhounds. She’s done three hellhounds before.

Thalia almost has her feet knocked out from under her by the three-foot-high waves. The air has become dim and gray, and smells of ozone. She risks a glance away from the hellhounds to the sky and—

That’s a hurricane.

That’s impossible. Sally checked the forecast before they left for Montauk, there wasn’t a hurricane within a week’s hurricane travel time, and no potentials out in the Atlantic near New York, either.

Did she—?

Thalia checks in with herself and no, she’s not nearly as tired as she would be to make an entire hurricane so she couldn’t have done it but Percy?

Percy’s ten, and in danger, and aware of who he is, and the son of the Stormbringer, and with a distressed son of the sky. They could have done it.

Maybe. Does Jason even know what a hurricane is? Thalia’s steered them away from the eastern and southern coasts during summer and fall for a reason.

The hellhounds attack, and there’s no more time to think about it.

Thalia whirls out of the way of the first, stabbing her knife into its flank on the way by, blasts the second back with a string of lightning, and would have been eaten by the third if a rouge wave hadn’t scooped her up bodily and flung her clear.

Water doesn’t behave like that, Thalia thinks, crashing back into the surf. She sucks in a lungful of seawater, coughs it back up, and staggers to her feet. She goes down on one knee and braces herself when she sees the charging hellhound and lets it impale itself on her knife. It bursts into dust and whirls away on the rising winds.

She rolls to the left, out of the surf, to escape the other two bearing down on her. She jumps, and the wind gives her a boost, and she flips neatly over the first hellhound and stabs downward at the second hellhound’s skull with the full force of her entire self falling through the air and almost beheads the monster. She lands, tucking the knives out to the side and somersaults on the landing through the monster dust and pops back to her feet to see the final hellhound has managed to turn on a dime and is going to flatten her.

It does. One paw lands on her chest, the size of a dinner plate, and bowls her back into the sand. The breath wuffs out of her, and she scrabbles to bring to bear her knives—

The world goes white.

She’s—alive?

Yes. She’s in the water. The white is hundreds of thousands of bubbles in the wave that just tried to crush both her and the hellhound both. She can see the black mass, now, that she assumes is the hellhound, writhing in the waters about four yards off to her left.

Follow the bubbles. The surface is only a few feet above her head, thank you, Poseidon, and she swims up and gasps for air and tries to look around. The sound is choppy, gray and violent with the sudden hurricane whipping everything into a froth.

She’s hundreds of yards from shore.

Thalia swears loudly enough that she’s sure the boys can hear her from here. Lightning flashes overhead to punctuate it.

What happened? Was there a storm surge and then a riptide? She couldn’t have been out for more than a few seconds, if she was out at all!

Teeth sink into her leg and she’s dragged down again.

The hellhound is terrifyingly adept at swimming in the water. Thalia is a good enough swimmer to keep her head above water and get back to dry land, and not much else. Practicing surviving the water more than was absolutely necessary seemed foolish, given that one uncle already hated her guts. She was not about to try to piss off the other one, as well. She’d only let Jason play in the surf if Percy was also there.

Thalia was not above holding his son metaphorically hostage if it meant Poseidon would play nice with her brother.

It makes passes at Thalia in the water, darting in to claw or bite at her and darting away before Thalia can get a good hit in. She’s slow in the water, from both the resistance of the water and from the lack of air.

Out, out, I need to get OUT OF HERE—

There’s something wrong at the surface.

It looks wild from down below, but Thalia needs air and she’s not aware of any monsters that like hanging out in the air in a hurricane, so she swims for the surface.

Oh look, she deadpans to herself. A waterspout. Just what I need.

Hurricanes spawn tornadoes frequently, this should not be a shock. But she needed a way out, and a waterspout would, in fact, get her out of the water, and also probably slice her to pieces.

Hmm.

She dives back under the waves, gets whirled around a couple times by a wave cycle, and finally spots the hellhound. It sees her about the same time.

Thalia, thinking, what the HELL am I doing? swims towards the waterspout. She swims as fast as she can towards the waterspout that’s probably only thirty feet away, but feels like a mile.

The hellhound is on her before she can believe it, and she grabs it by the chest fur, ducking under the dangerous teeth, hauls herself close, and swings around, hoping that her own momentum would do what she hoped. It did, it reversed them, so that the hellhound was closer to the surface than she was, and then Thalia braced both feet against its chest and blasted it back with a plume of bubbles.

My superpower, Thalia thinks, amused, bubbles.

Straight into the vortex it goes, and up, and up—

Thalia surfaces ten feet away, swimming backwards, and watches the hellhound get sucked more than thirty feet up before it dissolves into golden dust. She breathes out a sigh of relief. The waterspout dissolves just as quickly as it formed.

Can’t believe that worked, she thinks, and starts swimming to shore.

There’s a lot of yelling. And nobody can agree on who made the hurricane, or the waterspout, or the weird waves, but they’re all tired as Hades.

🗲

Thalia is eighteen and Jason is eleven and the world almost ended. It’s June 24th, mere days before Jason turns twelve, three days after Percy pulled some seriously stupid stunts for a month and then vanished again, and Thalia found out that he, Annabeth, and Grover found Zeus’s zappy wand and returned it in the nick of time before all out war broke out.

She and Jason storm Camp Half-Blood. There’s a lot of yelling involved, and some blood, and some swords stuck in places they should not be stuck. Luke pulls her off to the side and she has both hands wrapped around the edges of his breastplate because otherwise they’ll shake and she’s whispering, “What the fuck, Luke. He’s twelve. Why—How—?” over and over again into his collarbone.

“Thals,” he says, chuckling, wrapping her in a hug. “Those three are going to take over the world, and the world will be gladder for it.”

“They shouldn’t have to,” she says.

“I think world domination would be a self-directed and mostly accidental task, actually,” Luke says thoughtfully, and its such a ludicrous statement that Thalia falls into hysterical laughter.

#atc rewrite #all together cousins #pjo #fanfic #im excited actually #thalia pov #pre books and tlt #mostly pre books though #do i need to list the entire cast of characters #okay just the important ones #thalia grace #jason grace #luke castellan #percy jackson #sally jackson #hera #there are plenty of others but they're currently in fairly minor parts of the story or only mentioned

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daiyu-amaya · 5 months

Text

Hellsing Ultimate fic information kinda

I've been rewriting/revamping my Hellsing Ultimate Fanfiction 'Auction House' which is going to be renamed as I dislike the name now, and well my explaining Head Canon and other various things got a bit long so it's under the read more line lol

The Hellsing world has both Vampires and Werewolves so I decided why couldn’t I just add some creatures of the Dungeons and Dragons worlds too? Particularly Dragons! So, I decided to give Alucard a Dragon for an accountant as that made sense to my brain when I started the fic in 2018 apparently. So, she’s been his accountant around the time he went to America (Late 1800’s, so over a hundred years)

After he was captured, she just kind of continued to build his wealth and pay herself at the same time lol but because Dragons are inherently magical, she’s also the mage in my fic Auction house that allows Alucard to escape The Hellsing Family spell that keeps him trapped under their control.

When Enrico realizes that Alucard is no longer under Integra’s thumb, he freaks naturally assuming that Alucard is going to destroy the world like people believed he would if freed. Alucard finds this to be the height of stupidity because all he wants is a vacation. Or in the case of this fic a staycation.

My Dragon Mage-Whose had a bit of a name change over the years it started with Laelkae, Termaynth, and landed on Ceomru, Lady of The White. Or her human disguise name of Ceomru Trujillo finds the whole situation to be hilarious because reasons Enrico can’t leave, and Alucard really should stay out of sight for a second while the Hellsing organization freaks out about the loss of him-I mean they still have Seras.

Seras, now that was something I didn’t touch in the original fic, but in this new one she’s just a little confused because Alucard just basically went missing and then Integra realizes she has no power over Alucard and flips because no Hellsing Since Van Hellsing had ever lost control of Alucard and now, she literally has no connection to him anymore. Seras’ workload increases and the angel of Death comes back into play to help her out for a bit lol

Walter is pissed, he hated Alucard with all his little black heart and now the vampire is missing! How was all his betrayal going to work out now? Omg I can almost see the vein in his forehead twitching as he vents in pure rage stomping around in his room all mad that he isn’t sure where the bloodsucker went off to or what he’s up to.

Meanwhile, Alucard just having a little drink doing a two-step shrug dance while Enrico rolls his eyes and Ceomru cackles in the background stirring a potion. This is truly a chaotic Fic right now as I’ve plotted it halfway through and got a little muddled because Alucard answered his phone mid conversation and left me hanging there while he gives me the one moment finger talking to someone about only the devil knows what in a language I don’t understand.

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qqueenofhades · 1 year

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Another optimistic result from last night. Michigan's state legislature went blue for the first time since the Reagan administration. Dems were a superminority four years ago and now we run the entire state government, thanks in no small part to the independent redistricting commission that was created via a statewide ballot proposal in 2018.

We also passed a measure to protect abortion rights and broaden/strengthen voting rights. Basically, last night I had stress dreams all night about the end of democracy and I woke up to some good news. Things still aren't great and I'm anxious about races across the country, but I'm hopeful for the first time in a long time.

Michigan, Colorado, and Pennsylvania all had particularly good nights. Michigan Democrats won the governor and secretary of state races against cuckoo crazypants Q-challengers, protected abortion access, flipped the legislature, and expanded voting rights and access. In Colorado, all the Democratic incumbents won in a walk and might get an extra House seat from newly created CO-8. The biggest news there is that MAGA Barbie Lauren Boebert is still behind by about ~3500 votes in CO-3 with almost all the votes in. This is a R+9 district and shouldn't even be close. In Pennsylvania, Fetterman picked up a Senate seat for the Democrats despite all the doom and gloom and the intense GOP focus on Dr. Quack, Democrat Josh Shapiro easily beat MAGA lunatic Doug Mastriano for governor, and the state legislature is agonisingly close to flipping Democrat or at least almost even control.

Other morning-after thoughts from about four and a half hours of sleep:

As I said last night, the Democrats and Florida are Charlie Brown and the football. This isn't entirely their fault, as DeSantis has made it into his personal fiefdom and redrew the already-red maps to be EVEN MORE RED, threatened voters with his own goon squad, and otherwise turned it into Fascist Disneyland, literally. He cruised to re-election (ugh), but we still don't know how that plays outside his carefully curated media bubble where he only does interviews with right wing hacks like Fox and never answers tough questions. Lil Marco Rubio likewise beat Val Demings. Double ugh. So yeah, Florida Democrats are MIA. At least we got the first Gen Z member of Congress, 25 year old Democrat Maxwell Frost.

Whatever its untapped demographics, and unfair restrictions from obviously nonsensical voting laws, on the institutional level, Texas is not a blue state either. It just isn't. Beto ran a good campaign, but yet again, it wasn't close and Texas is just... Texas.

Hey anyone else think we should just let Florida and Texas secede?

However, my heartfelt sympathies to sane Floridans and Texans who worked hard but still had to see the same old crazy win.

Ohio and North Carolina also had Republicans win their Senate races. Tim Ryan and Cherie Beasley ran strong campaigns but it wasn't enough to overcome the increasing reddish tilt of those states (especially Ohio, which is also starting to look lost for the foreseeable future). However, they were both replacing retiring Republicans, so no change as far as the balance of power. Still despicable that that carpetbagging hack JD Vance is in the Senate, though.

Jury is still out in Arizona, where both Democratic governor and Senate candidates have narrow leads (governor more narrow), but if Katie Hobbs and Mark Kelly can pull this out, every single MAGA election denier candidate for governor/SOS will have lost.

That is GOOD NEWS for democracy.

Swingy Nevada is still looking dicey, though. As expected, its Democratic governor and Senate incumbent are behind after Election Day vote counting. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto is in a slightly better position than Governor Steve Sisolak. If big blue Clark County (Vegas) delivers its usual tranches of Democratic mail vote, they could both still probably win (CCM somewhat more likely since her deficit is smaller), but Nevada kept us anxiously waiting for days on end and seems fully set to do it again.

If Senate control comes down to yet another Georgia runoff between Raphael Warnock and Herschel "Me Good At Concussions And Abortions" Walker, I am going to scream.

Warnock is ahead but probably not enough to avoid a runoff under Georgia's ludicrous Jim Crow Senate rules where a candidate has to reach 50% to win outright.

Stacey Abrams also lost again to Brian Kemp. Ugh.

New York Democrats won the governor, AG, and Senate races, in not too much surprise but some of the late polling was close. They've had some struggles in suburban and rural NY, though managed to keep Pat Ryan's seat from the recent special election.

Way too many white people are still voting for Republicans, with the noted exception of 18-29 year olds, the only white age demographic to vote Democratic (by almost 2 to 1).

Looking at the data, 18-29 year olds from all demographics voting Blue are quite probably the only reason there wasn't a red wave. Good job, guys. I give you a lot of stick on here, but well done.

God, when will all those old white Republicans finally croak. They vote like clockwork every time and it's always bad.

Abortion access won everywhere it was on the ballot, including in deep red Kentucky (not overturning the current ban, alas, but rejecting a state constitutional amendment to ban it). Abortion rights are popular! Who knew.

This is an absolutely stunningly good result for an incumbent president's first midterm in any year, let alone with 8.5% inflation, economic pain, crazy fascists, and all the rest. Obama lost 63 House seats in 2010. So far, there hasn't really been a major change, and we still don't know who will control the House, after a lot of doomsters were insisting it would be Republican by 9pm ET on election night.

Democratic incumbents also won several tough re-election races in seats they would probably have lost in a red wave year.

Sarah Palin appears likely to lose in Alaska for the second time in three months. HA.

Trump was by no means the kingmaker. Almost all of his handpicked candidates have lost, with the exception of Vance in Ohio. Jury still out on Laxalt in Nevada (come THROUGH for CCM, Vegas, PLEASE).

Midterms are now not quite over, but at least moving to the rear view mirror. So when is Trump gonna get fucking indicted. That is the major next step on the Save Democracy checklist.

I likewise didn't think it would happen right after the midterms, regardless of who won; early 2023 remains my best guess. But also, like. Soon, please??

Anyway. If we lose the House (still not for sure) but keep the Senate, we can at least continue to confirm judges and other such important things. Having a tiny Republican majority (bleck) in the House would at least make it more difficult for them to do anything outrageously stupid, or at least have it succeed, as they would be sure to waste everyone's time with pointless stunts anyway.

Meh.

Still, though. By any metric, a big failure for Republicans, considering what their expectations were and how goddamn hard the media tried to help them at every turn, and a good showing for democracy as Democratic control was retained in key swing states and election deniers did not win any of their targets.

Stay tuned for more Election PutinDestielNevadaNovember5th...uh...8th redux!!!

UGH, NOT AGAIN.

#liptonrm #ask #politics for ts

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aj-the-idiot · 8 months

Text

Yes, hi, hello This is your local idiot speaking from the depths of the Void

I have finally managed to draw something for my Error x Reader fanfic Why & How that I will continue rewriting..... Eventually. (Hopefully)

I last posted something to the fic October 2018, * checks date * ALMOST 5 YEARS AGO?! The original is entirely in German, poorly written and, worst of all, on Wattpad....... However, I have already made plans for its rewrite!

Want a preview? Of course you do!

(These are parts of the first chapter but not all of it!)

It’s a beautiful day outside. Birds are singing, flowers are blooming… On days like these, people like you…

Should be going to therapy.

You grumpily turn off your alarm. Your bed is nice and warm and brings comfort, much unlike everything outside the bed. It’s a shame that you have to leave it… but it would be even more of a shame if you didn’t leave, having cleared your whole day for this one therapy session. Something just felt off, like you needed your time today, like today was just going to be a whole nightmare.

That, or it’s you just being so tired. The house has been especially lonely these past days without your family around. You would think, after all this time, you would get used to being alone but the guilt for being the only one to survive that detrimental car crash was still eating away at you. On top of that, you haven’t been sleeping well, always waking up in a cold shock and feeling like you’re being watched before falling asleep. . .

Anyway. Now is not the time, you need to get out and going! You get your tired body out of bed and open the blinds, the sunlight blinding you for a moment.

There are blue strings outside.

…not your problem! Who cares? It’s probably just your brain playing games with you. Just like those other times. Nothing to worry about! You move away from the window. It’s making you uncomfortable. At least you have a good start to that session with your therapist now. … You turn to the window again. It’s terrifying. Those strings are thick and looked charged, almost like cables on pylons just with magic, strange magic.

Suddenly your stomach growls, ripping you out of your trance. Today calls for a good breakfast.

You make your way to the kitchen and start making breakfast. Despite hoping eating would get your mind off the strings, your thoughts keep wandering back to them. Why are they there? How do they appear to be coming out of nowhere? Why Are They Here? How comes they are blue?

After staring at your dirty dishes for a while, being lost in thought, you put them in the sink; they’re a problem for future-you to deal with.

Your hands twitch as you take a look at the time, the feeling of not being safe rising up in you abruptly. Wonderful. Just wonderful. That is exactly what you needed right now.

Before you get tunnel vision, you should really get going.

Your morning routine, picking an outfit, trying to keep calm and not have a panic attack, everything felt difficult today. Neither your shoes nor your jacket wanted to cooperate with you when you put them on and you almost forgot to lock the door when leaving the house. That doesn’t matter though, not when you made it as far as to get on your merry way to your therapist’s!

The sunlight feels warm as you take a moment to breathe. It's a beautiful day outside…

(End of preview) What to expect from Why & How: - Bad humour - A gender neutral reader?! - Error being an idiot - Surprising twists and turns (definitely no sarcasm here) - Stupid clichés you've already seen a hundred times over!! - An English and a German version

It haunts me every day that I still have an unfinished fanfic that people actually read... Consider leaving a comment here on Tumblr or here (this is where I'll link Why & How when I'll upload it, just ignore it for now) in which you tell me to stop being a lazybones or anything else you'd like to say! (o゜▽゜)o☆

#utmv #undertale fandom #my art #digital art #error sans #error x reader #why & how #reader insert #x reader #my writing #fic preview #i promise i'm not giving up on this one #i'm just an idiot #and depressed

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mari-m-rose · 9 months

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Life update (?)

Hi! It's been a while since I did one of these. I still remember about how writing these would make me feel better, whether they were read by someone or not. Still, thank you in advance to whomever reads this, I appreciate your care/curiosity towards me. Wishing you happiness and success from the bottom of my heart. So, what has been going on with me.

So many things it's overwhelming. Everyday is. Especially when I remember all that has happened in the past few years. Probably because it's been hard to process? Both the good and the bad, all it's hard to process. Not like I process stuff easily, the opposite in fact. Tbh I don't even remember much of what I did during 2019... was I still active here during 2018? Bearly right? I think I got a new job in 2019 which was a cool job, or so I used to think... I remember the beginning of 2020 because I was so fucking happy in January-February during 2020. I was enjoying myself at work, I had a stable relationship with my partner as usual, I was engaged and about to get my own apartment. I was excited about my life which is something that never happens to me xD. And well, before covxd happened I actually got hit by a car... It was at low speed but it still wasn't nice. Listen, never do what I did. If you get hit by a car and you realize you can walk, do not go straight to work by scooter. Actually report the person who did it, call in sick, go to the hospital. Try not to shut down and just go to work normally. Short story: by lunch I couldn't stand up from my seat. I actually almost cried when I had to at the end of the day to go home because it hurt like a bxtch. I sort of healed? Actually it has been 3 years and I still feel something in my leg ahaha. Never be like me, love yourself. Covxd exploded not much after I "healed" and it ruined all my plans. No wedding, no apartment, I actually had to quit my job cause my bosses got so toxic I got depressed like never before. I was now trapped more than ever at my parents' house and the hope of leaving it soon was almost non-existant. I know it was hard for everyone and I hope that you all ended up surviving it just fine. Thankfully on my end everyone survived even tho my dad was always at risk cause he was forced to go to work despite it all. Since I didn't go through any tragic event, I am fortunate enough to appreciate that at least I spent a lot of time with my parents and cat, very important since I wanted to leave the house the next year. I got married in 2021 even tho covxd was still around, risking it all. Naturally it was a small event because of it. I actually just wanted to move out. My parents are very old-fashioned and they were not gonna be happy, so to say, if I left before marriage. Thankfully my husband did want to marry me so it worked out, but was it stressing... I just suck at events like that but yeah I finally got married and moved out. And the most amazing time of my whole life began. It was honestly magical. I was so happy I felt like I was living an actual dream. The moments in my life at that time felt eternal in a good way, there was warmth and love, pure happiness. I didn't know life could be like that. My relationship with my family fixed really quick after I moved out. Now we get along fine and I'm very thankful I get to experience this before I imminently lose my parents to time. I'm a very fortunate person. But this happiness soon ended cause I'm...dummy? I'm mentally ill and I'm not used to being happy. So I started to get massive anxiety about some upcoming event ruining all my life. I still dread this, even tho it doesn't arrive yet. Something bad actually happened tho... I lost my cat in 2022. I...probably will never not miss her, she was the one who kept me sane at home for 16 years. My most beloved baby...I just hope she's around somewhere. Uhm let's try not to cry while I write this... Btw did I mention I'm still unemployed and very ashamed of it? I do housewifey things, I do help with family business and have commissions from time to time but most of the time I'm not that active. That also is eating me alive. My husband is very chill about it but I'm not happy with myself, tho I can feel like little by little I want to change this, ...I wish I wasn't that stressed about the idea of still working in graphic design. What happened in my past job was a bit like my last bit of energy for it...

I really want to like open a patreon or a youtube channel idk, I always say this but its hard to start.. Aside this anxiety I'm also currently without passion...without fandom, without OTP, without a spark that motivates me to draw. It has been annoying cause this is happening since like 3 years ago. I hate this fr. Being without an art community has been hard but you know what? Being in one was also hard. I had major fall offs with a lot of my friends. We either fought a lot and took our distances or were involved in disgusting drama, others really mistreated me till the point I ended up feeling I didn't want to make new friends ever again. I isolated myself, this ofc didn't help my "art block" or mental health. Now at 32 yo, how am I supposed to like engage in a fandom or art community? I geniuinly don't know how. Also it's full of kiddies. No offense towards you babies but, I'm a grown ass lady. I feel so much like I don't belong...BUT I still want to belong. Not with the teens ofc but.... is there any discord server for old ladies like me? If there's a quiet place for "art grandmas" xD, hit me up. I am opened up to hang out but also ngl, I'm so awkward. New discord server I join is like another one I will never speak in. Idk what to do tbh. I just want to be excited about a fandom or art again. Anyways thanks for reading this text about me. I hope you are doing fine. I also hope you enjoy my art, even tho I hardly update, I'm trying to do my best. I'm most active on instagram (mari_m_rose) and X (aka former twitter, same as ig). I still love sinja and remain somewhat knowledgable about Magi. So if u wanna send asks about anything related to those or myself, I will be happy to answer! Hugs and kissus.

#stupidmarithings

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saidyes2heaven · 4 months

Text

song of the week: If I Believe You - The 1975

As i’ve been ruminating or for lack of a better word rotting this winter break, a mixture of feelings surround me.

gnawing deep into my own fears

thankful thinking of joyful memories

ecstatic for the unknown future

regret and guilt of my past mistakes

I’ve felt so caught up in my day to day endeavors being away at college. I forget my previous life even existed. My parents moved towns after my first semester, leaving behind the room I knew during my vital years.

The lime green walls I chose to be less “girly”

The curtains I picked out from a local Homegoods with the shimmers reminding me of the night sky

And my closet that my mom insisted on converting to a prayer room, to hold our idols and frames of several Gods and Goddesses

In highschool I used to pray every day to the Gods, for a better future, better control over my circumstances, maybe a dumb prayer hoping to ace a test I wasn’t ready for. The future was alright, circumstances rarely changed, and I still didn’t do well on that test, it became a pattern. Where was God? Why couldn’t they hear me? Was I not loud enough? Mom said if I repeated this prayer 108 times I would get what I wanted so why didn’t I?

Over time my faith lessened, as much as I craved control, I grew to feel indifferent to God and Godly power. I mean nothing changed: things still went sour for me consistently, yet there were still moments that kept me moving. 2 years into college, God was merely an idol that I gave almost no thought to. My mom would occasionally call me and INSIST on prayer as key to change life and feel whole with myself. I saw no evidence as her life was almost the same for the last 20 years: working a typical corporate job, taking care of the house, family vacations during breaks. Yet I wondered: how has her faith not wavered?

I wished to feel that way. I wished to find that faith. No matter how much my mom pushes me to pray and believe, I can’t find it in myself to feel connected with someone above me.

I made my own friends

I cooked my own food

I got myself through dark times

I dressed myself in the style I aimed for

Who am I giving credit to? The Universe? An all-knowing deity?

Would God create me knowing I wouldn’t believe in them at some point in my life? Wouldn’t God try to connect with me better knowing I want them to hear me?

So it’s 10:04 PM and here I lay on my own bed, just like the first time hearing the song in 2018 in highschool, listening to the lyrics repeat over and over:

If i’m lost then how can I find myself? If i’m lost then how can I find myself? If i’m lost then how can I find myself? If i’m lost then how can I find myself? If i’m lost then how can I find myself?

Hoping to find myself .

#Spotify #ruminating thoughts #the 1975 #religion

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starshine-hockey-girl · 2 years

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Star Crossed- Miro Heiskanen fic

Here is my very late summer fic exchange story written for @selfindulgentpoorlywritten who requested Reader Insert, fluff, smut (18+ only), angst - with a happy ending. It's my first time writing for Miro. I hope that you enjoy it.

@antoineroussel @fallinallincurls @princessphilly

Word Count- 7.6K

Author's Notes- I do play a little fast and loose with factual details and the realities of Covid

Warnings- alcohol use; some light verbal abuse; an abundance of fluff

Sunday-September 16th- 2018

Aurora looked down at her phone and saw a text message from her father, Jere Lehtinen. She sighed and walked away from the group. She, her boyfriend Brayden and their friends had gone to Top Golf for his birthday. Her father had been away at the Dallas Stars training camp for the past week.

Brayden dropped her back at her large house in Preston Hollow. “I’ll call you later,” she said as she kissed him on the cheek. Brayden and Rory had been dating for almost a year and Rory was ridiculously in love. They were the prototype of high school sweethearts who began dating their senior year of high school. Originally, Rory had planned on attending the University of Texas to major in Sports Management in pursuit of her dream job in the NHL. However, when Brayden had been waitlisted at UT, she changed her plans and went with her second choice of Southern Methodist University. He started at community college at Brookhaven. The change of plans had come as a huge disappointment to her father who did not want to see his precious baby girl change her dreams for a boy-particularly that boy.

Rory walked into the house and called, “Papa- I am home.”

Jere called from the kitchen, “In here, Pupu(bunny).” She walked into the large kitchen to give her father a hug. He squeezed her tight, “How was your night? How was Bray?” The disdain dripped from his voice.

“Papa, you know that it is BrayDEN,” she corrected as she eyed the young man standing at the end of the island. The tall brunette looked at the bubbly, young blonde, blushed and looked down again. Rory looked at her father and spoke in Finnish, “Who’s the boy?”

Jere looked at Miro then back at his daughter and replied in Finnish, “That’s Miro. I told you about him. He’s starting with the Stars and will be living with us until he gets settled into Dallas life.”

Rory looked back and forth between the two and spoke in English, “Staying here? In our house?”

“Yes and I want you to show him the ropes,” her father replied.

“What ropes?” she stared at her father in disbelief, “Is this the favor you wanted to ask me? Aren’t there some Finns on the team to show him the ropes?” she asked incredulously.

“Pupu,” he father replied with a sweet smile, “He needs someone his own age to show him the town. He can’t go hang out in bars with the other guys. Do your papa this favor.” Miro stared at the ground and listened into the conversation. He could understand the general idea of it even if the finer points were lost in him. He wasn't sure what the ropes were and why he would need to see them.

Rory rolled her eyes, “Fine, but he has to fit into my schedule- not the other way around.”

"Pupu," he chided his youngest daughter, "You know he will not have flexibility in his schedule. Why are you not willing to help him out?"

"I think you know why. Brayden won't like it if he is always hanging around. Also I am not wasting my time with some rookie that might be sent down to Austin within two weeks." Jere gave her the "look". "Papa, I have a life," she pleaded, "Okay, I will schedule something for next weekend."

“Thank you,” her father kissed her cheek, “Now, can you show Miro to the guest bedroom?”

Rory waited for Miro to join and spoke in Finnish, "I will show you the room and then we will come get your bags." They passed through the family room. Miro stopped and stared at the three Selke trophies prominently displayed in the built-in. Mementos of Jere’s impressive Stars and Team Finland career were scattered around the room. Rory moved to stand next to him as he looked at each item. She looked at the trophy then at Miro and spoke again in Finnish, "So you must be good if Papa is so invested in you.

"Yeah," he blushed and replied back in Finnish, “I think I have a shot.” He looked at the framed photo of Rory sitting in the bowl of the Stanley Cup at the tender age of six months. "Is that you?"

She smiled and continued in Finnish, "Yeah, I have hockey in my blood. Brayden hates it though."

They walked slowly to the guest bedroom. Miro turned at the door and smiled. "Is Brayden boyfriend? He should like things you like," he said in English. Rory's mouth dropped. "I speak English. Not much, but enough," he smiled, "I won't waste your time, bunny" Rory blushed and rushed to her room just in time for her nightly call from Brayden.

October 2021

“But why does he have to go?” Brayden whined to Rory. She adjusted her short sleeved Longhorn t-shirt and cut-off shorts.

“Because there isn’t anything more quintessential Texan than the State Fair and Texas/OU football game,” she replied. “You know, you could be a little more understanding about the situation,” she sighed, “Imagine that you were across the world from your friends and family- in a brand new city. Wouldn’t you want someone to show you around?”

Brayden walked up to her and lifted her up. He smiled, “Well, I don’t ever plan on leaving Texas so it will never be an issue for me.” She ran her hand over his broad chest and matching Longhorn shirt and pressed her lips together.

“You mean to live? You never want to live anywhere other than Texas?” she asked.

“To live and to be. I have everything I want and need here,” he joked as he kissed her cheek. He sat her down and playfully swatted her bottom.

“Not even to travel? Explore the world and see what else there is to see?” she scoffed.

“I mean, I’d go to Mexico or some place for our honeymoon, but that’s just about it.” he answered emphatically. Jere’s career had afforded Rory opportunities to travel the world much more than the average person her age. Between the annual trips in the summer to Finland and the international hockey tournaments, she had traveled extensively. She tried to imagine living a life that did not continue that sort of travel. It felt small-minded and unappealing, but Rory tried to dismiss the feeling. Brayden was her boyfriend and she loved him. She stared at his tall and muscular body. He was every bit of the stereotypical Texan that she was conditioned to want by her environment. She tried to shake the feeling that she wanted something more. Rory left him in the living room and walked to the bottom of the stairs. “Jäbä, are you ready to leave?”

Miro came bounding down the stairs with a smile, “Yes, Aurora” He spoke her name in an exaggerated drawl playfully, “I am ready to go to the great State Fair of Texas.” She rolled her eyes and poked him in the middle of the chest. She had spent the previous week explaining the fair and its intricacies to a very confused Miro. “So it’s a carnival?” he would ask in Finnish. She would shake her head emphatically and describe its wonders. Again he would tease, “So it’s a really BIG carnival?”

Brayden cleared his throat to get Rory’s attention. “We need to go if we want to do any sort of tailgating,” he explained.

Rory’s facial expression changed slightly and Miro noticed. “What’s tailgating?” he tentatively asked in English.

Rory answered back in Finnish, “It’s where people get drunk before a sporting event. In this case, because he is too young to legally drink inside the fair, he will start before the game.”

Miro looked from Rory to Brayden and asked in Finnish, “And this is not good? You don’t like it?”

Rory spit out in English, “No, I don’t like it. I don’t like it all.”

Three hours later-Cotton Bowl Stadium

Miro looked over at Rory and sighed. She was trying to put on a brave face, but he could tell that she was upset. Brayden and his friends had imbibed before the game and were now making fools of themselves at the game. After taking a commanding lead through the third quarter, the UT Longhorns were now seeing that lead decimated by a fourth quarter OU Sooner comeback led by Kyler Murray. When OU scored the tying touchdown with two minutes left in the game, Brayden and his friends effectively lost-their-shit. A tirade of cuss words flowed from their mouths. Despite himself, Miro laughed. Rory shared a glance with him before breaking out in giggles as well.

“What the fuck are the two of you laughing at, huh?” Brayden demanded and stomped his feet.

This caused Rory’s giggles to erupt even louder. “Look at yourself. It’s a FOOTBALL game- not the end of the world,” she said between laughs. Brayden looked back and forth between the two friends and felt his blood pressure rise. He got the sense that they were mocking him and he detested being mocked.

“Hey Finn boy,” he growled, “I don’t know what you are laughing at. You can barely speak English.”

“Hey,” Rory chided him, “If you are mad at me for laughing, then be mad at me. Don’t take it out on Jäbä.”

“Jäbä, Jäbä, Jäbä,” Brayden mocked, “What the fuck does that even mean?”

“Dude,” Miro interjected quickly.

“Don’t dude me,” Brayden replied, “We are NOT friends.”

Miro laughed, “No, it literally means ‘Dude’.” He turned to Rory and asked in Finnish, “How do you say nickname?”

“The word is nickname,” Rory answered in Finnish.

Miro turned around, “It’s nickname she have for me. You no like?”

“No, I don’t like it. I don’t like anything about you. You stupid foreign asshole,” Brayden countered, “You can’t even speak basic English.”

Miro took a step toward Brayden. “I can speak English.” Brayden took a step back. He had not anticipated Miro standing up to him. Just then the Longhorns ran the ball down to the twenty four yard line. Brayden turned his attention back to the game. Miro turned to face Rory with a question in his eyes. She softly shook her head no and looked down. “Aurora,” he said softly, “Don’t be sad. He’s drunk. No big deal.” Internally, Rory knew that it was a big deal. She knew that his temper was out of control and she was embarrassed that Miro felt the brunt of it. “Aurora,” he said again, “It’s not your fault.” They shared a tender look and she sighed before giving him a soft smile.

The stadium erupted in cheers as the Longhorns kicked a field goal to retake the lead. Brayden picked up Rory and squeezed her in a tight hug then placed a forceful kiss on her mouth. Miro watched in stunned silence. His heart raced and he felt an uncomfortable emotion pulsing through his body. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he knew that it was an immediate response to Brayden kissing Rory. Miro turned to observe half the crowd erupting in cheers while the other half looked dejected. “I’ll never understand football,” he thought to himself.

After the game, the group made their way to the Midway for rides and carnival games. Brayden, Jayden and Caden bribed another fairgoer into purchasing large beers for them so their buzz would keep going. Miro walked behind Brayden and Rory as Brayden led her through the crowd with a tight grip on her waist. A carnival barker called out to the group from the Rope Ladder Climb. “Hey Bro, win your girl a prize,” he called out to Brayden, “All you have to do is climb this rope and ring the bell. It’s as easy as pie.”

Brayden took a look at Rory and then looked back at Miro. “Yeah, I’ll do it,” he said as he pulled out his wallet. How much?” The barker informed him that it was ten dollars. “Hey Rory, can you spot me? I used the last of my cash for the beers.” She looked at him in disbelief.

Miro stepped forward and handed the barker a crispy twenty. Brayden looked up in surprise. “Him first and then me,” Miro said, “We see who wins prize.”

Brayden mounted the rope ladder and tried to balance his weight. He moved his right foot to the next rung and the ladder wobbled. He took another step and it wobbled again. His friends shouted suggestions to him- “Go faster, Tighten your grip, Go slower!” Beads of sweat covered Brayden’s forehead and palms. He began to lose his grip and with a final movement fell off of the ladder. He hit the inflatable with the palm of his hand and cussed, “Damn it, it’s rigged. It’s fucking rigged.”

Miro walked up to the ladder as Brayden exited and looked back at Rory. He gave her a sly smile and she giggled. “I go now?” he asked as he balanced on the ladder. The barker gave him the go signal and Miro took off. He nimbly climbed, moving his opposite limbs in a fluid motion- left, right left, right. Brayden stood in stunned silence as Miro reached the top within seconds and rang the bell in victory. Miro jumped off the ladder and slid down the inflatable. He flashed Rory another smile as he said to the barker, “You right- easy as cake”

Rory laughed, “Jäbä, pie- the phrase is easy as pie.”

Miro simply shrugged his shoulders, “I was close.”

The barker instructed Miro to pick from the top row of prizes. Miro laughed as he pointed to the prize he wanted. The barker pulled down the large stuffed animal and handed it to the Finn. Miro took the prize and placed it in Rory’s hands with a flourish. “Pupu pupulleni,” he said gallantly in Finnish. Rory hugged the prize and hid her face to hide her blush.

“What the fuck did you say?” Brayden demanded to know.

“A bunny for my bunny,” Miro replied in English. He turned to Rory, “You like, Aurora?”

Brayden tried to rip the bunny from Rory’s arms, “You are not taking that from him. You are not.” He screamed in her face, “You are MY girlfriend- not his fucking bunny. Give it back to him.”

Miro stepped in between the two, “Back off.”

“Oh, look at who is back to his broken English again,” Brayden mocked.

Rory yelled, “Stop it- stop it Brayden”

“Give her the bunny back and walk away Brayden. Don’t ever scream at her like that again,” Miro said firmly while he stared into the Texan’s eyes, “Is that English good enough for you?” He turned to Rory in Finnish, “Aurora, I think it’s time for us to go home. Do you want me to get an Uber to take us?”

Rory looked back and forth between Brayden and Miro. She was going to disappoint one with any decision made. She thought quickly and blurted out, “Miro is going to take me home. You're drunk and if my dad sees it, he is going to be furious. Call me tomorrow when you are sober. We can talk then.” She looked at Miro and spoke in Finnish, “Get me out of here and away from him, Jäbä. I just want to go home.”

Miro nodded and grabbed her hand before he responded in Finnish, “Yes, my bunny.”

December 31st, 2018

Three hours later, Miro called from the party at Tyler Seguin's house.

Miro: Aurora- are you coming?

Rory: No Jäbä- I am not.

Miro: Why not? What happened?

Rory took a deep breath: Brayden broke up with me

Miro: He what?

Rory: He broke up with me- via text

Miro: Where are you?

Rory: Home

Miro: I am coming to you.

Miro hung up the phone before she could protest. He left the party without telling anyone and made it to the Lehtinen home in less than fifteen minutes. He unlocked the front door and walked into the house, “Aurora, it’s me Jäbä. I am home.”

Rory called from the kitchen, "I am in here." He followed the sound of her voice and found her sitting at the island. A bottle of vodka sat in front of her. He glanced at her as she opened it and poured herself a drink. "Want one?" she asked dejectedly.

“When will your parents be home?” he asked quietly.

“It will be late. They are at the Morrow’s New Year’s Eve party,” she said quietly.

“Only one drink,” he cautioned, “Tell me what happened.”

She slid her phone across the counter to him, “Read for yourself.”

“He cheating on you? With Maddie?” he looked up in surprise.

“Yep,” she said sardonically, “My guess is that it’s been going for a while now. Lots of stuff makes sense now.”

Miro studied her face. Her usual bubbly demeanor had been replaced with sadness. She took a long swig of her drink. Tears fell from her eyes as she spoke softly, “Papa was right about him. He was right all along.” Miro took a step toward her and she backed away. “I wanted so much to make it work. He was perfect from the outside.”

“Not perfect for you,” he tried to comfort her, “He treated you bad.”

“My stupid stubborness got me into this mess,” she cried, “I wanted to prove everyone wrong. I wanted to prove my papa wrong. I wanted to prove you wrong. I gave up my dream for someone who never really loved me- at least not in the way I loved him.”

Miro reached over and took the glass from her hand. He walked over to the sink and poured the contents out. She watched him silently and without opposition. “Have you eaten?” he asked. She shook her head no. He nodded his head, “We order pizza and talk” Rory walked away as Miro used his phone to order pizza. He found her seating on the large sectional in the family room. She eyed him with curiosity as he sat on the opposite end.

“Why are you here, Jäbä?” she finally asked, “Isn’t there a party at Seggy’s tonight?”

“You need a friend tonight,” he answered quickly.

“Oh,” she replied, “Why do you want to be my friend, Jäbä? Why are being so nice to me?”

He looked up in surprise, “I am nice to you because you were nice to me. You help me learn English. Show me ropes.”

“Is it bad that I don’t feel sad about Brayden? Maybe that’s a sign, right?” she asked.

“Good sign,” he answered, “Tell me about dream you gave up for him.”

“I was supposed to go to UT because their program for Sports Management is better than SMU. When he got waitlisted, I switched to stay with him,” she explained. “At UT, I could study abroad. I might even be able to study in Finland and work with Team Finland,” she smiled at the thought, “I know a couple of guys that would have put in a good word for me.”

“It’s not too late,” Miro suggested, “You could still have your dream.”

Rory stared at him for a moment and considered the possibility. She felt a sense of excitement. She mentally went over what she would have to do to procure a transfer. Miro studied her as a smile spread across her face. “You’re right. I could still have my dream,” she said. She stood up and paced as she let her mind embrace the possibilities that awaited her. Suddenly she rushed over to Miro and squeezed him a tight hug. “Thank you Jäbä,” she whispered in his ear, “Thank you for being my friend.”

“Thank you, Aurora, for being my friend,” he squeezed her back.

March 2019

Rory stood in the kitchen and studied her phone. There was an email from the University of Texas admissions office. She tried to will herself open it. She had jumped through hoops to meet the deadlines for transfer. Now she awaited the answer and it sat in her email inbox. Miro walked into the house from the garage. She looked up at him with expectant eyes and he blinked back. Mentally he calculated the date and remembered that the answer should be arriving today. “Good answer?” he asked. He had a front row seat to all of the work that she had put into the transfer. Not only that, the hard work that she continued to do to maintain her 4.0 GPA at SMU.

“It’s here, but I am afraid to open it,” she whispered. He walked over to look over her shoulder at her phone.

“Open it, Aurora. I bet it is good news,” he encouraged.

“I am scared, Jäbä,” she whined, “You do it.”

“You know my English shaky,” he joked as he took the phone.

“You can read the important parts. Tell me,” she pleaded.

He opened the email and skimmed the contents before a smile spread across his face.

“Yes?” she asked quickly.

He nodded his head emphatically, “Yes! You start this fall.”

Rory jumped up and down, “I got in? Jäbä, I really got in?”

“You got in, Aurora,” he cheered. Suddenly Rory threw herself into his arms and he squeezed her tight. They spun around as they both reveled in her joy. He set her back down and she stared up into his eyes. Their hearts raced and they struggled to catch their breath. Rory felt herself drawn to him and before she knew it, they kissed. His hand cradled the back of her head as their mouths opened to each other and he tasted the flavor of her Burt’s Bee vanilla bean lip balm. He groaned softly as his tongue slid across her lips to taste her better. It was delicious and exhilarating at the same time. They were lost in the unexpected thrill of the kiss and didn’t hear her parents arrive home. Jere cleared his throat loudly. Rory and Miro pushed apart quickly. Rory looked from her father to Miro and back again. Her father stared at Miro who looked down in a combination of fear and embarrassment. An uncomfortable silence loomed in the air before Miro spoke. “Rory has news for you,” he said quickly. Rory stared at him for a moment. He never called her Rory. It was always Aurora. Her face pinched in surprise. He turned and walked out of the kitchen.

She looked at her parents who studied her closely, “Ummm, I got into UT. I just got the news today. Jäbä read it to me.” Her father held out his arms and she ran into them. “Papa, are you happy?” she whispered, “Are you proud of me?”

“Always” he said proudly. He let her go so she could hug her mother, Jana. Afterward, they stood in awkward silence. “We should go out and celebrate. I will take you to your favorite restaurant,” her father suggested. “Go invite, Miro. He should come,” he added.

Inside of his bedroom, Miro paced while his mind raced. He drifted back to the memory of their kiss. It felt right and natural although completely unexpected. He was unsure what it meant if anything. “She got in,” he said to himself. It’s not as if he expected her not to get in, but he had never considered the reality of when she got into UT. It was March now. At the latest the Stars season would conclude in June. That is only if they made the Stanley Cup Finals. After that, he would go back home to Finland. She would be in Austin when he returned. He thought of Brayden and how she had given up her dream for him. Would she do the same for him? Could he allow her to do the same?

He was absorbed in thought when Rory knocked softly on Miro’s door, “Jäbä? Can I come in?” The door opened and he stood to the side. Her eyes searched for any sign of how Miro felt about the kiss, but his face revealed nothing. “My parents are taking me to dinner to celebrate. Do you want to come?” she asked tentatively.

“No, I don’t think it’s a good idea,” he replied, “I think it should just be your family.”

She inhaled sharply, “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” he answered, “I won’t be home when you get back. I am going to go hang out with Big Rig.” He made a mental note to send a SOS text when Rory left.

“Oh okay,” she mumbled and turned to go.

“Aurora,” he called as she walked down the hall. She turned to look at him. “I am proud for you.

“Thanks,” she responded quietly.

Later that night

Miro entered the house quietly. The Lehtinens didn’t have very many rules for the young defenseman while he stayed in their house, but coming in at two AM would certainly be frowned upon. He had just returned from hanging out at Big Rig’s apartment where they had played video games for a few hours. He walked through the house and stopped suddenly when he saw Rory sitting at the bottom of the stairs. “Hey,” he said, “why are you up?”

“I wanted to talk to you,” she said quietly, “about earlier.”

“Oh,” he replied, “You mean the kiss?”

“Yeah,” she answered in Finnish, “Do you regret it?”

His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Regret? No, I don’t regret it,” he answered back in Finnish. He sat next to her on the stairs. She looked at him with questions in her eyes. He looked down and took a deep breath. He had been thinking all night of how to discuss what had happened. Even though he though he had a prepared answer, when he looked at her pretty face so full of hope and promise, all the words escaped him. There was the answer he WANTED to say and the answer he NEEDED to say. “Aurora, the kiss was amazing. I don’t regret it, but I don’t think it should happen again,” he said gently. The disappointment was written all over her face. “You gave up your dream for Brayden once. I can’t let you give your dream for me. I don’t think that we can work as anything other than friends. It’s not right,” he explained in Finnish.

The pain of rejection stung Rory and she spit out quickly in Finnish, “Presumptuous of you to think I would give up my dream over a single kiss. You’re right. We are better off as friends. I am glad that we cleared that up.” She got up and started up the stairs.

“Aurora,” he called quietly.

She turned, “It’s fine, Miro. We’re friends. It’s all fine.” It was his turn to flinch at the sound of his name. Rory stormed up the stairs and slammed her door before throwing herself on the bed. Miro got up slowly and climbed the stairs. He paused outside of her door. The sound of her crying was barely audible and it killed him. “I’m sorry, Aurora, '' he whispered before returning to his room.

May 7th, 2021- St. Louis

Rory stood in the hotel lobby waiting for the Stars players to return from the Enterprise Center. The Stars had been knocked out of the playoffs in a devastating loss in double overtime. She texted her father who confirmed that the team would return to the hotel that night instead of flying back to Dallas. Rory and Miro had seemingly recovered from the awkwardness of their kiss and his subsequent rejection of her. She focused on school and he focused on his play and the playoffs. There were still occasional hang-outs but the laughter didn’t flow as freely. Their shared times together were punctuated by awkward times of silence. Still she cared deeply for him and it had nearly broken her heart to watch him in the handshake line.

There was a subtle buzz in the air when the team started walking into the lobby. Various Stars fans cheered while a group of Blues fans jeered. “Jäbä,” she called to Miro as passed her. He looked over and she gave a bright smile. He reluctantly walked to her and allowed her to hug him. She felt the tension in his body and released the hug. “You played so well,” she said enthusiastically.

“We lost,” he said bluntly.

“I know. I am just trying to cheer you up, Jäbä” she replied.

“Maybe I don’t want to be cheered up,” he chided.

“Are you mad at me? What have I done?” she said in surprise.

“No, I just don’t want to be cheered. I want to be alone,” he blurted out.

“Okay, Jäbä,” she said meekly, “I will see you tomorrow.”

He nodded and turned to the elevator. He made the long walk to his room and replayed the conversation in his mind. He had been exceptionally curt and rude to her attempt at support. “Stupid,” he thought, “She was just trying to be a good friend.” Miro walked into his room and stared at the bed. “Dammit,” he thought, “I don’t want to leave it like this.” He turned around and left the room. When he turned the corner to walk down the hall to Rorys’ room, he did a double take. Big Rig stood behind Rory as she opened her door. His hand was on the small of her back. When the door opened, Rory turned around and hugged him tightly. Miro blinked and turned and walked away.

The next morning Miro ate his breakfast in silence next to Esa Lindell. Oleksiak walked into the room with a swagger that did not fit the mood of the rest of the team. Seggy looked up and joked, “Big Rig- why are you so happy? You know that we lost, right?”

Oleksiak joked back, “We may have lost but I found someone to ease the pain.” Miro stopped mid-bite and stared at Big Rig. “Gotta love those blondes,” he joked, “They make everything better.”

Esa Lindell glanced over at Miro, “You okay?”

Miro swallowed the bitterness and bile that rose in his throat, “Yeah, never better.”

January 2021

Jere signaled the DJ to lower the music. The Lehtinen family hosted an annual party at the beginning of the season which because of Covid had been delayed to January. Tonight's party served also as a quasi celebration for Rory who graduated in December. She was set to start her dream job in the Stars organization the next week.

Jere spoke into the microphone, “Hello. I want to take a moment to be a proud papa. Pupu, where are you? Come to me.” Rory groaned and sheepishly walked to her father. “Our Aurora completed her degree in Sports Management at the best school in the world. She finished her study abroad with Team Finland and will now start her new job working back at home. Her mother and I could not be more proud. Raise your glass and toast the smartest and most beautiful girl in the room.” She felt her cheeks flush with heat as the guests toasted her. She resisted the urge to look around for Miro to see his response. She was sure that she would find him standing next to a buxom blonde wearing next to nothing.

If she had looked up, she would have seen him standing in the corner by himself, staring at her with a mix of regret and pride. He could not be more proud of the woman that she had grown into. She radiated intelligence and kindness. All of the things that drew him to her when they first became friends. He continued to stare in the hopes that she would make eye contact, but it didn’t happen. Instead his eyes fell upon the tall frame of Oleksiak and he remembered that night in St. Louis. It was the last night he had seen Rory face to face.

After that night, he returned to the Lehtinen house, packed his things and took the first flight available back to Finland. Rory had texted and called several times, but he did return them. For all intents and purposes, he ghosted her. During the past two years, he had kept track of her activities via social media. There had been no serious boyfriends and she appeared to be thriving in Austin. He was unaware that she was doing the same. The multiple pictures of Miro with scantily clad women hanging all over him was a disappointment.

Rory circled the room and made all the appropriate small talk. Her stomach churned with the thought of running into Miro. They had not spoken in years, other than a brief "Good Luck" text exchange during the Stanley Cup Finals. A full year had passed since then and the confusion and rejection still felt as real and raw as that summer of 2019. After getting roped into a dreadful conversation with Tyler Seguin and his girlfriend, Rory went outside to get some fresh air.

Despite it being January, the weather was mild and Rory took a deep breath. The familiar scent of Miro's cologne hit her nostrils and she spun around to see him leaning against the pergola. He laughed at her surprise and she shrieked in Finnish "What are you doing here?"

"I was invited by your father," he replied in perfect English. Miro scoffed, “I am surprised that you aren't huddled up to Big Rig.”

Rory eyed him suspiciously, “And why would I do that?”

Miro looked down as the memory of Rory hugging Big Rig flashed in his mind’s eye. The accompanying pang in his heart and stomach felt entirely too familiar. “You did have that one night thing in St. Louis,” he whispered, “I figured that you kept in touch with him.”

Rory’s head twisted around, “We had what?”

“I saw him at your hotel room in St. Louis, Rory,” Miro said quietly.

“And?” she questioned, “Do you know why he was at my hotel room? What do you think happened, Jäbä?” Miro’s head popped at the word Jäbä. She hadn’t called him that since they stopped talking in 2019. She stared into his green eyes and saw the pain. She bit her lip and contemplated the cause of it. “Jäbä, tell me what you think happened.”

“You slept with him. That’s what I think happened,” he bluntly answered.

Rory gasped deeply, “Wait, is that why you started ignoring me? You pushed me away because you thought I slept with Big Rig?” He nodded his head and walked away. He stood on the edge of the pergola and looked over the manicured backyard. “I didn’t, by the way,” she added, “Even if I had, why didn’t you talk to me about it? You just quit talking to me based on an assumption. I was that disposable to you?”

He turned and looked over his shoulder, “What was I supposed to say, Rory?” he said with disgust, “Did you sleep with my liney? After everything we went through, you slept with him?”

Rory stared at him and tried to process what was happening. A feeling of disbelief started which quickly transformed to anger. “Why would it matter if I slept with him, which I did not. We were friends. You threw away our friendship over an assumption?”

“It wasn’t an assumption! I saw what I saw,” Miro asserted before he realized that it, indeed, could have been an assumption. He flashed back and replayed the memory. Big Rig stood behind Rory as she opened her hotel room door, she turned around, they hugged and then he had turned away in disgust. He assumed that Big Rig had gone into the room based on his behavior the next morning. He could have been wrong is the thought that hit him like a two by four in the chest. “What was the reality then? Tell me what happened,” he inquired.

Rory walked over and stood next to him. “You left me in the lobby after the game. I tried to talk to you about the game and you blew me off,” she started to explain. Miro grimaced at the reminder of his childish behavior. “Pretty soon I got surrounded by a group of drunk Blues fans who taunted me about the game,” she continued, “They yelled at me and one of them poured a can of beer on me.” His eyes flashed up at her revelation. “The next thing I remember is the sound of Big Rig’s voice booming ‘Get away from her. Move away from her.’ He grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the group. He led me to the elevator bank and made sure I was physically unharmed. He asked if I wanted him to do something about it, but I told him no. I just wanted to get to my room so that’s what he did. Nothing else happened.” She turned and he turned to face her. “I texted you when I got into my room but you never responded. I tried calling and texting but you disappeared into thin air. I needed my friend and you vanished like a ghost.” They stared at each other and reality began to sink into their minds. Rory waited for a response from Miro and was met with stunned silence. "Guess that English isn't so good after all," she sighed. She turned to walk away, “Have a nice life jäbä.”

He watched her walk away with a grimace on his face while he cursed himself in Finnish. Rory put her head down and walked toward the back set of stairs. She dwilled her eyes to contain the tears that threatened to overflow. Where had the sweet boy from Espoo gone? Where had her friend gone? “Hey-heads up Rory,“ she heard Oleksiak joke as he passed her in the hall. She looked up and was reminded of the stupid misunderstanding with Miro and the tenously grasp she had on her emotions released. Tears escaped from their containment and rolled down her face. “Hey, hey, hey- why are you crying, Rory?” Oleksiak asked softly, “This is your party too. What’s wrong?”

She shook her head, “He thinks we slept together. He thinks we had a one night stand in Nashville,” she cried.

“What?” Oleksiak gasped, “Who thinks that?”

“Miro- Miro thinks that,” she sobbed, “That’s why he pushed me away. That’s why he ghosted me.” Oleksiak stared at shoulders that shook with sadness and paused. His mind raced. To be honest, he hadn’t given much thought to why the pretty blonde had been missing from Dallas Stars events. He just assumed that she had been consumed by college life and the natural progression of distancing from her parents and their interests. He assumed that the relationship between the two had fizzled from the distance. His eyebrows furrowed. The news that he had somehow been involved surprised and troubled him. “You told him the truth, right?” Oleksiak asked gently.

Rory nodded her head, “I told him but I am not sure that he believes me.”

“I’ll go talk to him. I will straighten it out, Rory,” he assured her.

“Thanks, but I am not sure that there is a point. The Miro that I loved doesn’t exist anymore, I guess.” she said softly. Her eyes widened at the realization of what she had just admitted. Oleksiak pulled her into a tight side hug and she relaxed into his body.

“Oh he exists, Rory. He puts on an act around a lot of people, but he still exists in there,” he reasoned. He released her from the side hug and bent down to look her in the eyes. “Don’t think that your relationship can’t be repaired,” he implored, “I think it can.”

Rory nodded her head and then gave a soft smile, “Thanks, Big Rig.” She turned and made her way upstairs to her bedroom.

Oleksiak turned and returned to the party. He yelled, “Anyone seen Miro?” There was a collective no response. He turned and made his way outside. He found Heiskanen sitting on a bench under the pergola, staring at the ground. “Hey dude, I hear you might have some questions for me,” he stated bluntly. Miro looked up at the tall specimen of a man in confusion. “Something about a one night stand?” Oleksiak prodded. Miro groaned out loud. “What the hell, Miro?” Oleksiak asked, “You really thought I would make a move on your girl?”

Miro pressed his lips together, “You slept with someone that night. You bragged about it the next morning.”

“Not sure if I would call it bragging, but fair point,” Big Rig.

“So if it wasn’t Rory, who was it?” Miro asked.

“Does it ever matter? It wasn’t your girl. That’s all you need to know,” he answered, “I have too much respect for Rory to refer to her a blonde. Come on, Miro.”

“She’s not my girl. She has never been my girl,” Miro protested.

“Anyone with eyes can see how you feel about her or at least how you FELT about her,” the Canadian scolded the Finn. “We all saw how you were together. Considering that you are sitting here with your head hung down, I think that those feelings haven’t changed,” he continued.

“It won’t work. She doesn’t like me like that,” Miro spoke softly, “At least not anymore. I managed to fuck that up.”

Oleksiak reached over and smacked Miro in the back of his head, “You’re an idiot if you can’t tell that she likes you as more than a friend.”

“Owwwww,” Miro exclaimed, “You didn’t have to hit me.”

“Somebody needs to knock some sense into you,” Oleksiak spoke firmly, “She’s right. You have changed. You are trying to pretend to be someone that you’re not.”

“What do you mean?” Miro asked.

“Look-I like Seggy and Chubbs, but you are not like them. You trying to be this “I don’t give a fuck” player off the ice and it just isn’t you.” Oleksiak answered directly. “Stop pretending to be someone that you are not. You play with all of these puckbunnies when you know in your heart that you are in love with Rory.”

Miro tried to protest and thought about Rory. The pain that he felt when he saw the hug could not be attributed to friendship. The constant longing to see her was unexplainable. It had been years since they had spent time together but he couldn’t get the sound of her laughter out of his head. He smiled when he thought about her smile and the funny jokes she told him.

“What do I do?” Miro asked.

“Go tell her. Go tell her the truth,” Oleksiak spoke bluntly.

“Just like that?” Miro questioned.

“Just like that or I am going to kick your ass in training camp,” Oleksiak joked. Miro got up and punched Big Rig in the arm. “Hey-watch the violence,’ he explained.

“Payback is a bitch, huh?” Miro said as he walked away.

Miro walked up the backstairs and down the hall to Rory’s room. He knocked softly, “Aurora, it’s me-Jäbä.” He got no response, “Can I come in?”

The door suddenly opened and she stood in front of him. “What do you want, Miro?” she sighed.

“I want to explain. I want to tell you what happened,” he answered.

She stood to the side and let him enter. He turned to her and she eyed him warily, “So talk.”

He looked at her and paused. Her physical beauty took his breath away. She was no longer the teenager that he fell in love with. She had grown and matured. Though he would have sworn it would be impossible, she had become even more beautiful. “Ummmm,” he stammered, “Ummmm, first I should say I am sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” she challenged him.

“Sorry for ghosting you,” he replied meekly, “I didn’t know what else to do.” She raised an eyebrow and he continued in Finnish, “I saw you in the hall at the hotel. You’re right. I made an assumption- a wrong assumption. I was just so- I don’t know- when I saw you with him.”

“You were what?” she prodded.

“Jealous!” he spoke quickly in Finnish. “I was out of my mind with jealousy. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t admit it after telling you what we should be friends. I couldn’t admit the the truth.”

“What was the truth, Jäbä,” she yelped.

“The truth was,” he paused and continued in Finnish, “The truth is that I love you and the thought of you being with him drove me crazy. I should have said something. I should have told you, but I was afraid. I was afraid I had blown it after our kiss.”

Rory’s jaw dropped, “What did you say?”

Miro looked her into her eyes, “I said that I love you, Aurora.”

Her eyes filled with tears, “When- then or now?”

He stepped towards her and grabbed her hand. He intertwined his fingers into hers, “Both. I loved you from that moment in the kitchen. I loved you every moment that we spent together. I loved you then and I love you now.”

“Really?” she blushed but pulled his body to hers, “All that time?”

Miro slid his arms around her waist, “All that time.”

“That’s good,” she spoke as her lips ghosted over his. “Because I love you too.”

He brought her mouth to his and kissed her with passion. Rory spoke breathlessly, “Say it again.”

“I love you my bunny,” he moaned as he kissed her.

“I love you my Jäbä,” she moaned in return.

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